The Convoy (IC, FT)

[The Solar Reign]

(Note: This is the IC to this OOC. Please apply and be accepted before posting here. Thanks.)

GAS Attentive, in Orbit of Mane Calamari
Commodore Roller leaned back in her chair. She was a unicorn-mare, usually commander of the Battlegroup Attentive, grouped around her flagship, a cruiser of the Majestic class.
Today's orders weren't her usual patrol, though: A few days ago, the Pangmare Supervolcano on Maretesia Prime blew up. This was the Outer Rim, the edge of the space claimed by the Reign and even near the border (as long as someone could speak of 'near' in space). In all her wisdom and glory, Princess Celestia didn't call for a whole fleet of the Golden Armada to mobilize, but for a small group of ships of the GA to assemble at Mane Calamari, to meet with help convois from other nations in order to get up a coordinated help for the billions of people on the planet. The problem was, that the planet's ecosphere wouldn't really be able to survive the whole affair, so they would have to evacuate.
Vice Admiral von Kloppenburg was already present with ships and assisting where he could, but he was equipped for a normal patrol, not desaster relief. They, however, were.
"Alright.", Roller called over her bridge, "Comms, make a rollcall for all ships, ours and friends. We should get underway!"
"Aye, Ma'am!", the stallion at the comms-station (his name was Whisper) replied crisply. "All ship of the relief convoy bound for Maretesia Prime, this is GAS Attentive, please report status. Over."
Roller, meanwhile, had a very bad feeling about this whole operation.

[The Children of Celestia]

INS Chardonnay (née Rightious Wrath)
The GA trasmission came over the gilded speakers of the Chardonnay's bridge, it looking more like a palace ballroom rather then a command centre. At least all the money he spent on prettying up the ship went into fixing it too. XO Auralia Anemone sighs and presses the transmit button. "This is the Chardonnay, all ships accounted for here. Thank the Empress for that." Meanwhile Admiral Chardonnay sat in his chair, sipping a glassful of his namesake. "On a scale of one to ten, how attractive do you think this Commadore is? She sound like a six."
"Sir!"
"What? I wanna know who I'm working with."

[Corvus Heavy Industries]

Aquila System, One Month Ago...

"WHAT?" The Old Crow, Alan Gryphus, CEO of Red Crow and Captain of the Nobis asked the Frozen-Iron representative. Red Crow Enterprises had been here for just under 5 years, and now their biggest competition had purchased rights to the system. "I believe you heard well enough, Mr. Gryphus. You must leave the system and cease business here with 3 weeks or face confiscation of all properties and assets. We have a hauling convoy if you require it, for a nominal fee of 400,000 credits." She wasn't joking, the paperwork checked out and everything in the ownership rights was legal. "...Very well then, you bloody demons. I'll go. You'll never see us again, and yes, I would like that convoy." The move would be less about packing and more of where to go. "We have a recommendation." The woman said. "There is an uncharted asteroid field which lies equidistant from numerous small nations, as well as a larger empire of alien life. An empire that has an exclave claimed adjacent to you, that would likely have nobles willing to pay nicely for safe passage, due to rampant piracy."

Well, he had no other real 'options' other than what this lady proposed, boy did he hate getting monopolized. "Right, I'll inform my people."


"Princess Belt," Present Day

"Now that we're done with that business, everyone head back to the Crow's Nest for R&R while we reestablish the FTL beacon. Need some business, after all." The Old Crow said to his fleet after dealing with some lowlife pirates with only a poorly-built asteroid base as a home. He had never become fully used to the natives being so... Colorful, but at least they paid in something that could be converted into standard credits, and they were nice enough. Having received the payment, the Old Crow wished the rather concerned noble farewell. The naming scheme was simple too, whatever their personality's defining trait was, they were typically named after it. That was when the broadband transmission from a bloody Empress came in talking about a relief convoy for some poor rock on the other side of the Crow's Nest. In fact, it was coming through the very trade route that would bring it through them. It sounded like Red Crow was near the end of this filthy-rich, royal, lightly-armed convoy's destination. "Oh, that won't do... Why couldn't this be the first stop?" He lamented. "Bah, they'll probably be roughed up enough by the locals by the time they get to us to hire us on principle. Might want to come back through there too." He mused as the fleet entered warp. It wasn't long before they arrived at the Crow's Nest. Nice little station, too small for the Nobis or the Boneyard, but big enough for the rest, and some transport shuttles were fine to get the crew inside.

"Captain." An ensign started. "Now that we're back at the Nest, I've been meaning to ask. How'd you get this vessel? I thought the Harrier-Eagle Class was the most sophisticated vessel that Corvus had in the Battleship size category, how could you afford it?" The Old Crow laughed at the youth's question. It was break time for now, so he'd entertain the rookie's question. "Mr. Ravenhart cut me a deal. Woulda cost me 5 Billion credits if I didn't make Red Crow. Turns out the Partner Company Clause is still good. Course I still gotta make payments for it until I beat out the interest, but it's insured. I paid 3 Billion instead of 5, and I used the rest of the money for insurance, and for business expenses, like making this PMC." The payments he still had to make were worth 400 million, the ship was practically his. One more good job, or the insurance from one of the fleet's cruisers exploding, would pay it off in full. Today was good, and he was just waiting for a new job.

[The Solar Reign]

INS Chardonnay (née Rightious Wrath)
The GA trasmission came over the gilded speakers of the Chardonnay's bridge, it looking more like a palace ballroom rather then a command centre. At least all the money he spent on prettying up the ship went into fixing it too. XO Auralia Anemone sighs and presses the transmit button. "This is the Chardonnay, all ships accounted for here. Thank the Empress for that." Meanwhile Admiral Chardonnay sat in his chair, sipping a glassful of his namesake. "On a scale of one to ten, how attractive do you think this Commadore is? She sound like a six."
"Sir!"
"What? I wanna know who I'm working with."

Lieutenant Commander Whisper, the comms-officer aboard the Attentive, heard the return message and the banter. He glanced over to his Commodore, who was occupied with reviewing the status of the fighter squadrons transported by the ships under her direct command.
There weren't many, but hopefully enough to deter any pirates and other usual suspects. She certainly had something, when one had a thing for mature mares. He liked his fillies young and fresh though, so he simply replied: "Understood, Chardonnay. We wait for the others, then we are off."
Sasly, Sir, I can't answer your question., the stallion thought to himself, I want to live a long and happy life, you know...
"Ask Admiral Chardonnay, if he is interested in having dinner aboard the Attentive, when everything is over." Roller's voice startled the young stallion a bit. "I will invite everyone, so it will be a bit of a party!"
Whisper relayed the message dutyfully.

[The Children of Celestia]

INS Chardonnay (née Rightious Wrath)
The GA trasmission came over the gilded speakers of the Chardonnay's bridge, it looking more like a palace ballroom rather then a command centre. At least all the money he spent on prettying up the ship went into fixing it too. XO Auralia Anemone sighs and presses the transmit button. "This is the Chardonnay, all ships accounted for here. Thank the Empress for that." Meanwhile Admiral Chardonnay sat in his chair, sipping a glassful of his namesake. "On a scale of one to ten, how attractive do you think this Commadore is? She sound like a six."
"Sir!"
"What? I wanna know who I'm working with."

Lieutenant Commander Whisper, the comms-officer aboard the Attentive, heard the return message and the banter. He glanced over to his Commodore, who was occupied with reviewing the status of the fighter squadrons transported by the ships under her direct command.
There weren't many, but hopefully enough to deter any pirates and other usual suspects. She certainly had something, when one had a thing for mature mares. He liked his fillies young and fresh though, so he simply replied: "Understood, Chardonnay. We wait for the others, then we are off."
Sasly, Sir, I can't answer your question., the stallion thought to himself, I want to live a long and happy life, you know...
"Ask Admiral Chardonnay, if he is interested in having dinner aboard the Attentive, when everything is over." Roller's voice startled the young stallion a bit. "I will invite everyone, so it will be a bit of a party!"
Whisper relayed the message dutyfully.

"Excellent, I'll bring my XO along." The young, clueless admiral drains his glass before pouring himself some more. "Aurelia, mark it down." The mare glances up from her display, power readouts covering the screen. "I'm a bit busy checking the Nova Cannon's operability, y'know? The thing that fires plasma bolts that can blow up battleship and small planets."
"Nah, you have time to write on a sticky note, right?"
"Why don't you?"
"I'm busy doing… admiral stuff."

[The Solar Reign]

Lieutenant Commander Whisper, the comms-officer aboard the Attentive, heard the return message and the banter. He glanced over to his Commodore, who was occupied with reviewing the status of the fighter squadrons transported by the ships under her direct command.
There weren't many, but hopefully enough to deter any pirates and other usual suspects. She certainly had something, when one had a thing for mature mares. He liked his fillies young and fresh though, so he simply replied: "Understood, Chardonnay. We wait for the others, then we are off."
Sasly, Sir, I can't answer your question., the stallion thought to himself, I want to live a long and happy life, you know...
"Ask Admiral Chardonnay, if he is interested in having dinner aboard the Attentive, when everything is over." Roller's voice startled the young stallion a bit. "I will invite everyone, so it will be a bit of a party!"
Whisper relayed the message dutyfully.

"Excellent, I'll bring my XO along." The young, clueless admiral drains his glass before pouring himself some more. "Aurelia, mark it down." The mare glances up from her display, power readouts covering the screen. "I'm a bit busy checking the Nova Cannon's operability, y'know? The thing that fires plasma bolts that can blow up battleship and small planets."
"Nah, you have time to write on a sticky note, right?"
"Why don't you?"
"I'm busy doing… admiral stuff."

Whisper nodded. "Sir, if it is all the same to you, I can call again, when we are ready."
And if we survive this stunt..., he thought. There were some seriously dangerous groups along their route, which would most likely not be stopped by the argument, that they were transporting goods for desaster relief. The Red Crows, mercs fighting for everyone who paid them, were one example. The problem with mercs was, that one didn't know, if they were against a person or not until they shot. And then there was Abiotic Annihilation in the Regimare Cloud. The convoy would pass them and, if intelligence was correct, they had a considerable bit of firepower.
They had firepower as well, sure, they had it of the plenty, starting with the Chardonnay's Nova Cannon up to the fifteen Trilithium Torpedoes, which were carried by every Majestic. The Novy Cannon might be powerful enough, to blast a moon apart, that much was true, but torpedoes with Trilithium warheads, sprayed over an atmosphere in the right pattern, made every ounce of life impossible, poisoning rivers and plants and the very air for roundabout fifty years.
They had 45 of these things with them, just standart equipment, but still... it sent a shiver down Whisper's spine. Anyway - he had a duty to perform. "Anything we have to look out for, Sir? Allergies, stuff unliked, and so on?" He felt less like a highly paid fleet officer and more like a waiter, but anything for HDM.

[The Children of Celestia]

"Excellent, I'll bring my XO along." The young, clueless admiral drains his glass before pouring himself some more. "Aurelia, mark it down." The mare glances up from her display, power readouts covering the screen. "I'm a bit busy checking the Nova Cannon's operability, y'know? The thing that fires plasma bolts that can blow up battleship and small planets."
"Nah, you have time to write on a sticky note, right?"
"Why don't you?"
"I'm busy doing… admiral stuff."

Whisper nodded. "Sir, if it is all the same to you, I can call again, when we are ready."
And if we survive this stunt..., he thought. There were some seriously dangerous groups along their route, which would most likely not be stopped by the argument, that they were transporting goods for desaster relief. The Red Crows, mercs fighting for everyone who paid them, were one example. The problem with mercs was, that one didn't know, if they were against a person or not until they shot. And then there was Abiotic Annihilation in the Regimare Cloud. The convoy would pass them and, if intelligence was correct, they had a considerable bit of firepower.
They had firepower as well, sure, they had it of the plenty, starting with the Chardonnay's Nova Cannon up to the fifteen Trilithium Torpedoes, which were carried by every Majestic. The Novy Cannon might be powerful enough, to blast a moon apart, that much was true, but torpedoes with Trilithium warheads, sprayed over an atmosphere in the right pattern, made every ounce of life impossible, poisoning rivers and plants and the very air for roundabout fifty years.
They had 45 of these things with them, just standart equipment, but still... it sent a shiver down Whisper's spine. Anyway - he had a duty to perform. "Anything we have to look out for, Sir? Allergies, stuff unliked, and so on?" He felt less like a highly paid fleet officer and more like a waiter, but anything for HDM.

"No, nothing like that. Just have my name on every bottle of wine." Chardonnay chuckles. "Sir, your father tasked me with ensure…" Aurelia starts before the Admiral interrupts her. "My father's a sector away, governing New Eden, while I'm here, on my own ship. I'll drink if I feel like." The XO rolls her eyes and mutters to herself. "Just like his father, stubborn to a fault."

[The Fedral Union]

The Triton flew through the infinite expanse of hyperspace; its cobalt blue contrails behind its angled sleek form fading in to the tides of chaos that formed around the ship . Hyper space; the place where the fundamental laws of the universe came from; where other universes existed in other domains. Nothing short of a god if one even existed could comprehend the true scale of this turbulent meta space. The Triton was en-route toward a particular system; it was designated the flagship of what was Task force 31. The mission was simple on “paper” an escort and rescue operation. Star command nor the GRF could ignore a call from its allies to assist them in a time of need. And so here the ship was, leading on a task force of 12 ships ranging from frigates, to strike carriers, to destroyers and cruisers.

In the Tritons CIC; the mood of the crew was slightly tense, after all they were heading into a situation where they could be dealing with a great many things; not the least of which was the slow and agonizing deaths of innocent beings. This was less a fear and more of a driving force at this point in time. Alot of star command had been trained for many situations; but training only went so far. The officer chosen to head this mission was a tall; well built brown eyed red haired rear admiral by the name of Deviron Callisto, at the age of a hundred and two he still appeared in his early thirties , no doubt this was a testament to longevity technologies. The CiC was filled with the blips, and beeps of consoles being manipulated by officers on either side of the circular command center; the primary holographic display noting the task forces course appeared clearly before Callisto. During his long life time he had many experiences many jobs; and only joined star command fifty years ago. Deciding he had enough of the various pursuits in life he considered mundane.

Callisto placed a hand on his well shaven squared jaw. He was dressed in the typical flag officer's uniform with the addition of the GRF mission patch to his left shoulder; platinum and white lines trimmed around the black backdrop of the uniforms material; only one of two features to stand out; the others where his epaulettes, gold in color with platinum rank insignia each with a single star along with several service ribbons over his heart.; he sunk into his command chair his eyes glancing from holo console to holo console then to Tritons avatar.

-”Eta until our arrival?”-

The avatar didn’t bother to appear in her photoform projection opting to stay in a fluid vast medium of post singularity existence that only she could understand. She replied with a soft voice; Callisto shifted in his chair as he watched the ships getting closer and closer.


-”We should arrive there momentarily, we’re detecting quite a bit of activity; however they all register as friendly. I think this is train of ships we’re meant to escort,; we’ve got a lot of comm traffic between them and from the affected system.-

Callisto pondered; should he have one of his strike cruisers cloak and shadow the rest of the task force or should he go in showing full colors so t speak. The gears in his mind turned and a few seconds later after glancing to the main three dimensional display; he decided he’d rather have a specter above keeping watch than the Terran ships all going in full view; it was just tactically sound.

Motioning a hand in a fluid fashion Callisto ; said with an accent common to union city.

-”Tell the Republic to run silent; full cloak pattern specter 3”-

Pattern specter 3 was a code for a cloaked ship to loiter close to its objective keeping an eye out with its vast sensors and to feed information to the main battle group; it was also a term meant to cover any vulnerable areas it might spot.

The sophont replied, with that same voice; this time her avatar appeared, it took a microsecond second for the complex message to be sent and reply to be received and processed by the powerful Avatar of the Triton.

-Captain Jaisn of the Republic and its AI acknowledge and are now engaging silent mode. We’re about to jump in to the specified coordinates Admiral. Shall I take the liberty of notifying the convoy of our arrival?”-

Callisto almost chuckled but smirked instead; he nodded and then said with a hint frankness in his voice.

“With the output of our hyper drives and D cores they should have seen us light years away, nonetheless we don’t want to spook anyone.”

And so Triton spoke; it sent out a general signal to every ship within their general area. It was a plain; well tendered message.

Code: Select all

 This is the Terran Alliance Ship Triton; in command of task force 31 and representing the Allied powers , I believe you were expecting us?  We will assist in any manner we can; we’ve brought transports, equipment and other star ships.

Just as that message was sent eleven ships opened swirling mass that would shine as bright as white dwarf stars for a mere instant; giving anyone who would be fast enough a glimpse of the meta space beyond the fabric of space and time.The angled forms of the Terran ships brushed off the seemingly angelic ; and cascading aura of colorful particle energy that they had accumulated around them; these particles seemingly danced across the hull of the ships only to be ultimately sucked back into the spatial whirlpool that was a gateway to infinity.

Each ship came to a crawl the wormholes closing almost instantly as they were spat out, the Triton was at the head of the formation; one of the most modern; multirole and heavily armed ships in the Terran fleet; built to the same standards as her sister ship the republic who didn’t appear in such a flashy fashion of course; but phase shifted in; its cloaking system using a combination of quantum manipulation, interital manipulation and stasis shielding to keep it completely concealed. This complex system however did have its flaws; if it tried to activate its weapon systems or pump more power into its defensive fields; it would cause serious strains on the D core and conduit systems overloading them with demands for energy. Even ships as advanced as the Terran's had limit.

-”All ships being moving into position ; wait for a reply before we make a move; and keep an eye on sensor readouts; I don’t want any surprises.”-

Castillo said commandingly the contrails of each of the ship's phase engines swirling in a cobalt blue fashion only to be distorted and faded as space bulged behind the ships to propel them. The smaller and larger Terran ships formed into a picket formation common for task groups; maneuvering with extreme dexterity and nimble speed to achieve a three dimensional staggered triangular formation


End of part one the Arrival.

[The Ctan]

Duat

The core of Nasarin’s ship was a slim spar of metal a little over forty meters wide, and over a mile long. Its surface was raised and pocked here and there with a series of hundreds of clamps and dozens of doors, while its spaceframe was reinforced with collapsed matter woven through living metal. Companionways were threaded through it, and elevator tubes, but neither were normally used. Instead, local teleportation was the norm, between the blockish service modules at either end of the ship, while the larger cargo transfer needs were met by the spine-duct, a wide space lined with grapples for just that purpose. Across the spine’s depressurized central tube dozens of doors were set up, allowing access to any of the two score or more colca modules that would sit on the sides and top of the central spine. Each was an irregular hexagonal prism two hundred meters long and the best part of a hundred high and wide. The standard, ubiquitous module was a containerized cargo unit capable of holding thousands of smaller intermodal containers in its tracked interior, and with its own light-duty grav unit, capable of making orbit or descending from it – in principle of longer journeys also.

Beyond the spar was the other head of her ship; like a weight-lifter’s irons, the two heads of the ship, when it was without its cargo, seemed like strangely constructed, ungainly vessels. When they were fully loaded they looked far better, like sleek if blocky spars of metal. Their angular design followed function closely, and the Taminamba or “forgehammer” class colony ship had been its mechanical predecessor.

She turned back to the briefing table behind her, a broad marble piece with a series of indentations for papers, devices, cups and similar on it. It pulled double duty as a formal dining room at times and could be overlaid with a gleaming malachite upper-surface that folded in slats. Around the table a number of officers were gathered. Like her they wore flexible black skin-suits, a form of light protection rated for micro-meteoriod exposure, under their grey utility uniforms. There were no rank insignia or obvious signs of military eminence, for this was a civilian ship, and one that had no need of such posing.

On one side of the table sat Silas, the ship’s integrated communications officer, who acted as the de-fact first officer. Silas was a human or Lizaan ethnicity, and wore unusually short tight hair, he tapped on the marble surface and frowned, reading the stark characters of the displays on the table, paging through them. “A lot of ships in the port queue,” he said, hand swishing across the surface to flip pages. Each container queued for loading was being retrieved from Duat’s deep storage wells. Unfortunately, to some degree that meant that they were slower to load than standard containers. While a simple cargo shipment might be easy to accomplish, the majority of the containers that were being brought up were habitation-containers that would need full individual testing and pre-flight before use to meet the required safety standards. “Might take up to an hour before we’re loaded,” he said.

That was a long time. A ship like the Culindamacil could load and stow its payload in a fraction that time if the payload was ready, but in order to meet with the Liasa request their ship along with so many others was responding to. The term Liasa, or the Right of Liasa, was a word that the Necrontyr notion of social contract gave a special power, compelling obligation on the listeners to assist in a matter of utmost severity and on the speaker only to employ such a word seriously when truly necessary. The Liasa concept, broadly interpreted, gave an ability for full citizens to requisition Necrontyr resources and fellow citizens to a cause. The concept was similar to the ancient Romanii concept of Auctoritas; though in some respects quite different. As part of the Great Civilization the standards of public decorum required that one respond where possible to such a request. To overcome the Observer Effect, that where a request for aid would be ignored on the assumption that ‘someone else would do it’ the Liasa required that any persons in a position to assist such a formal request and aware of it express their willingness or suffer formal shame from their failure.

Of course, where some ancient cousins to the C'tani concept of eminence, known in domestic necrontyr as Arthetesh, had various tribal or religious concepts, their own version was deliberately and consciously blind to birth and intrinsic characteristics, women could gain it as easily as men, technologically sired intelligence as easily as organic, and things from the prosaic differences from religion or sexual orientation to the living and the undead, were all considered equal, at least formally. Likewise, it was considered a means of encouraging morals, not a moral end unto itself, thereby by acting morally, one accrued the respect for Arthetesh, but lost it by the inverse action.

Only other C’tani would normally use the formalities of Arthetesh, of course, but as a courtesy it was generally presumed to apply to others of the highest dignity, it was not a precisely formal rule, there were no laws or investigations, but it was taken as seriously as the mores of any other society. For this reason the request made by Celestia the Undaunted Princess had been taken with the appropriate seriousness by the C’tani, who had raised a large number of volunteers.

It was not unusual; there was no officer present who didn’t have at least an ancestor who had been a slave, or targeted for genocide, or in some other way oppressed until they had been liberated or rescued by the C’tani. The C’tani had launched many aid missions down the years, and by the formal mores of their society a willingness to participate in more of the same was considered essential.

By responding to requests for aid, one gained greater social standing in the eyes of society, in the same way that one might gain by performing a respected profession or gaining monies in most other societies; therefore the loss of income for most present was regarded as little burden. The Culindamacil had unloaded her cargo containers here with Flight-Commander Nasarin’s formal explanation and apology to her clients, and requests for the harbourmasters to resolve such cargos within their deadlines where possible. There would be inconvenience, but they didn’t stand to lose any business in the future or lose much in the way of monies, the virtus-economy of the Great Civilization ran quite parallel to and was in some ways more important than the mere monetary one. There was a simple reason for this; in the Great Civilization, money was not power, and effectively could not buy it; so many things of key importance were produced in hyper-abundance that they were impossible to monetize.

“We’ll have to live with that,” Nasarin said, “What’re we carrying?”

“Mixed load,” he said, looking to his left.

Sharenai, the Payload Deployment and Retrieval Officer, nodded, keying up a breakdown of their berths. Forty eight In all. Eight each along the dorsal and ventral sides, end to end, and sixteen per side, side-by-side.

There were a number of different types of cargo loaded, most of them, as might be expected, were either container-rescue – that was to say, they were loaded with thousands of standard intermodal shipping containers filled with supplies for use by persons in the disaster zone, or in travelling from the disaster zone, others, were habitation, set up as small towns essentially, that could hold hundreds of people in comfort and rather more in this stripped down ‘crisis response’ pattern. A few were Q-modules, which appeared as container-storage units but were quite different given their role, while others were medical – containing entire hospitals, or rescue craft modules, hover-on transport for thousands of light rescue skimmers or even orbital range modules. Three were fabrication, equipped to aid in production of supplies, the breakdowns of these resulted in most being bulk-CHON processing, that could convert organic matter rapidly. Any standard fabricator could accomplish the alchemical mysteries of transmutation from any substance to any other, and most could even use energy, but maximum efficiency was usually gained by simple processing rather than transmutation.

A few, also, were container-utility, containing prefabricated equipment for tasks like building emergency shelters and decontamination, not all necessary in this instance, until someone let a nuclear-pile melt down or something equally unforeseen, in which case having such equipment to hand would be extremely useful.

“There it is,” Nasarin said, pointing at the number three dorsal spineload. “Starport module, never carried one of those before,” she said. Naturally, the peak throughput of the local starports would need to be increased; these were equipped to be landed in a suitable area, fusion-form landing pads and pits around them, and be set up as a terminal for orbital traffic.

“Yes, took some work to balance it,” Sharenai said, flicking her fingers over the display and colouring it by local mass. In the days of reaction-drive ships her job would have been to balance the payload for manoeuvre. Today, it was more to do with grav-stresses and unexpected actions, as well as supervising the sheer quantity of cargo-tender units that a ship like the Vingilot used, “But we’re fine with this configuration. And as long as nobody brings a neutronium basketball on board, we’ll be fine going back as well,” she said. The image amended to simply show sixteen of the current containers attached, the thirteen habitation modules and three Q-modules. “Our first run out will let us shed most of the immediate relief payload and head back to Mane Cal, where the load service unit should be ready for us with a full load of hab modules.”

The huge C’tani fleet was not all going to be going immediately. Some would be running a much safer route between Mane Cal and their home ports to bring out more modules; the ideal operation conditions were to have three full loads of modules per ship; that way they could be unloading at Mane Cal, loading at Maretesia Prime and also in flight, all simultaneously.

"How are we for Life support with the hab-modules?" Nasarin asked.

"All of them are online independently of course," Pear Blossom said, her job within the ship was known as the ECM, or more properly, the Environmental Consumables Manager, "We're tanking LOX to overpressure safety limits on all tanks to be on the safe side, and storing emergency disposal and water should one of the hab units suffer a breakdown, but we should have enough tender capacity on the habships to fix anything that goes wrong."

"You sound unusually concerned."

"I'm more concerned by the prospect of attack than I am anything else," Blossom said. "The hab units contain shelters, but they're not isolated by internal air section as well as our decks are, and if one of their compartments is breached, we could be losing rather a lot of air before the maintbots close it up."

"Right, the pirates, what are we doing for the people if we get hit?" Nasarin asked.

"Well the habunits have standard counter-boarding suites, and secure shelters within them, which we'll be using our volunteers as orientation staff for," Sharenai said, "And we're supposed to be planting some star-marshals too, if we get enough volunteers with combat rating," she went on for some time after, as they discussed the mission.

Mare Calamari

The first ship of the C'tani flotilla to arrive, though not the 'flagship' in a militaristic sense, had been chosen for the symbolism of the ship. Just under two miles long and practically as wide¹, it was an expanse of green metal, with its outer areas built in an imperialistic, almost militant style, but where its hull caved inward, in recessed areas, fabricated gold glistened over limestone cladding and pink rose quartz crystals obscured by the tonne to decorate it. On its moth-like neutrino radiator and grav-vane wings, which expanded as it decelerated from hyperspeed, feathered filigree of shining gold was laid across these ornamented components, and they were painted in shining pearlescent white. Upon its high sides were silvered runes that were laid in necrontyr sine-script and in equestrian, Undaunted Celestia. A few moments later another, its sister-ship, a similar habitation vessel, Celestia Regnant, adorned similarly but with its rose quartz replaced with pale quartz with metallic coatings to give it a rainbow effect. These were followed by over a hundred other ships of various sizes and classes, some bigger, many smaller, and a pair of huge Great Ships.

Transmission Source: Flotilla Liaison Yarias Silpasdottir ita Hyrekh, Mayor-Captain of Habitation Vessel Charlemane
Destination: Vice Admiral von Kloppenburg of the Golden Armada of The Solar Reign
Subject: Maretesia Prime Relief Mission
Security: Unencrypted General Broadcast

Dear Admiral von Kloppenburg,

Please allow me to express my thanks for your government's acceptance of our assistance in this matter, it is always a delight to be of service to those in need, and we are pleased to aid you in this matter. Please find attached the details of the capacities and abilities of the vessels assembled for our part of this fleet. Furthermore, please at your liberty, advise us to any security precautions you feel necessary for this operation, such as stationing your personnel aboard our vessels; while naturally a degree of appropriate caution will be employed in such matters with regard to any proprietary components and issues, we would welcome the extra security provided by any contingents of your own personnel who can be sent, and naturally, any volunteers from Mane Calamari who may wish to accompany us to provide medical or stewarding assistance, as may well be imagined, staffing for an operation of this size is always a challenge, and we would be most pleased to have any extra hooves available for such tasks, and any such persons will of course be accorded our best hospitality and courtesy under the circumstances.

Yarias ita Hyrekh,
Flotilla Liaison Chief

OOC:
¹ When I get onto art of the Ascension class, it'll be based on this Jupiter Ascending concept.

[The Children of Celestia]

Duat

The core of Nasarin’s ship was a slim spar of metal a little over forty meters wide, and over a mile long. Its surface was raised and pocked here and there with a series of hundreds of clamps and dozens of doors, while its spaceframe was reinforced with collapsed matter woven through living metal. Companionways were threaded through it, and elevator tubes, but neither were normally used. Instead, local teleportation was the norm, between the blockish service modules at either end of the ship, while the larger cargo transfer needs were met by the spine-duct, a wide space lined with grapples for just that purpose. Across the spine’s depressurized central tube dozens of doors were set up, allowing access to any of the two score or more colca modules that would sit on the sides and top of the central spine. Each was an irregular hexagonal prism two hundred meters long and the best part of a hundred high and wide. The standard, ubiquitous module was a containerized cargo unit capable of holding thousands of smaller intermodal containers in its tracked interior, and with its own light-duty grav unit, capable of making orbit or descending from it – in principle of longer journeys also.

Beyond the spar was the other head of her ship; like a weight-lifter’s irons, the two heads of the ship, when it was without its cargo, seemed like strangely constructed, ungainly vessels. When they were fully loaded they looked far better, like sleek if blocky spars of metal. Their angular design followed function closely, and the Taminamba or “forgehammer” class colony ship had been its mechanical predecessor.

She turned back to the briefing table behind her, a broad marble piece with a series of indentations for papers, devices, cups and similar on it. It pulled double duty as a formal dining room at times and could be overlaid with a gleaming malachite upper-surface that folded in slats. Around the table a number of officers were gathered. Like her they wore flexible black skin-suits, a form of light protection rated for micro-meteoriod exposure, under their grey utility uniforms. There were no rank insignia or obvious signs of military eminence, for this was a civilian ship, and one that had no need of such posing.

On one side of the table sat Silas, the ship’s integrated communications officer, who acted as the de-fact first officer. Silas was a human or Lizaan ethnicity, and wore unusually short tight hair, he tapped on the marble surface and frowned, reading the stark characters of the displays on the table, paging through them. “A lot of ships in the port queue,” he said, hand swishing across the surface to flip pages. Each container queued for loading was being retrieved from Duat’s deep storage wells. Unfortunately, to some degree that meant that they were slower to load than standard containers. While a simple cargo shipment might be easy to accomplish, the majority of the containers that were being brought up were habitation-containers that would need full individual testing and pre-flight before use to meet the required safety standards. “Might take up to an hour before we’re loaded,” he said.

That was a long time. A ship like the Culindamacil could load and stow its payload in a fraction that time if the payload was ready, but in order to meet with the Liasa request their ship along with so many others was responding to. The term Liasa, or the Right of Liasa, was a word that the Necrontyr notion of social contract gave a special power, compelling obligation on the listeners to assist in a matter of utmost severity and on the speaker only to employ such a word seriously when truly necessary. The Liasa concept, broadly interpreted, gave an ability for full citizens to requisition Necrontyr resources and fellow citizens to a cause. The concept was similar to the ancient Romanii concept of Auctoritas; though in some respects quite different. As part of the Great Civilization the standards of public decorum required that one respond where possible to such a request. To overcome the Observer Effect, that where a request for aid would be ignored on the assumption that ‘someone else would do it’ the Liasa required that any persons in a position to assist such a formal request and aware of it express their willingness or suffer formal shame from their failure.

Of course, where some ancient cousins to the C'tani concept of eminence, known in domestic necrontyr as Arthetesh, had various tribal or religious concepts, their own version was deliberately and consciously blind to birth and intrinsic characteristics, women could gain it as easily as men, technologically sired intelligence as easily as organic, and things from the prosaic differences from religion or sexual orientation to the living and the undead, were all considered equal, at least formally. Likewise, it was considered a means of encouraging morals, not a moral end unto itself, thereby by acting morally, one accrued the respect for Arthetesh, but lost it by the inverse action.

Only other C’tani would normally use the formalities of Arthetesh, of course, but as a courtesy it was generally presumed to apply to others of the highest dignity, it was not a precisely formal rule, there were no laws or investigations, but it was taken as seriously as the mores of any other society. For this reason the request made by Celestia the Undaunted Princess had been taken with the appropriate seriousness by the C’tani, who had raised a large number of volunteers.

It was not unusual; there was no officer present who didn’t have at least an ancestor who had been a slave, or targeted for genocide, or in some other way oppressed until they had been liberated or rescued by the C’tani. The C’tani had launched many aid missions down the years, and by the formal mores of their society a willingness to participate in more of the same was considered essential.

By responding to requests for aid, one gained greater social standing in the eyes of society, in the same way that one might gain by performing a respected profession or gaining monies in most other societies; therefore the loss of income for most present was regarded as little burden. The Culindamacil had unloaded her cargo containers here with Flight-Commander Nasarin’s formal explanation and apology to her clients, and requests for the harbourmasters to resolve such cargos within their deadlines where possible. There would be inconvenience, but they didn’t stand to lose any business in the future or lose much in the way of monies, the virtus-economy of the Great Civilization ran quite parallel to and was in some ways more important than the mere monetary one. There was a simple reason for this; in the Great Civilization, money was not power, and effectively could not buy it; so many things of key importance were produced in hyper-abundance that they were impossible to monetize.

“We’ll have to live with that,” Nasarin said, “What’re we carrying?”

“Mixed load,” he said, looking to his left.

Sharenai, the Payload Deployment and Retrieval Officer, nodded, keying up a breakdown of their berths. Forty eight In all. Eight each along the dorsal and ventral sides, end to end, and sixteen per side, side-by-side.

There were a number of different types of cargo loaded, most of them, as might be expected, were either container-rescue – that was to say, they were loaded with thousands of standard intermodal shipping containers filled with supplies for use by persons in the disaster zone, or in travelling from the disaster zone, others, were habitation, set up as small towns essentially, that could hold hundreds of people in comfort and rather more in this stripped down ‘crisis response’ pattern. A few were Q-modules, which appeared as container-storage units but were quite different given their role, while others were medical – containing entire hospitals, or rescue craft modules, hover-on transport for thousands of light rescue skimmers or even orbital range modules. Three were fabrication, equipped to aid in production of supplies, the breakdowns of these resulted in most being bulk-CHON processing, that could convert organic matter rapidly. Any standard fabricator could accomplish the alchemical mysteries of transmutation from any substance to any other, and most could even use energy, but maximum efficiency was usually gained by simple processing rather than transmutation.

A few, also, were container-utility, containing prefabricated equipment for tasks like building emergency shelters and decontamination, not all necessary in this instance, until someone let a nuclear-pile melt down or something equally unforeseen, in which case having such equipment to hand would be extremely useful.

“There it is,” Nasarin said, pointing at the number three dorsal spineload. “Starport module, never carried one of those before,” she said. Naturally, the peak throughput of the local starports would need to be increased; these were equipped to be landed in a suitable area, fusion-form landing pads and pits around them, and be set up as a terminal for orbital traffic.

“Yes, took some work to balance it,” Sharenai said, flicking her fingers over the display and colouring it by local mass. In the days of reaction-drive ships her job would have been to balance the payload for manoeuvre. Today, it was more to do with grav-stresses and unexpected actions, as well as supervising the sheer quantity of cargo-tender units that a ship like the Vingilot used, “But we’re fine with this configuration. And as long as nobody brings a neutronium basketball on board, we’ll be fine going back as well,” she said. The image amended to simply show sixteen of the current containers attached, the thirteen habitation modules and three Q-modules. “Our first run out will let us shed most of the immediate relief payload and head back to Mane Cal, where the load service unit should be ready for us with a full load of hab modules.”

The huge C’tani fleet was not all going to be going immediately. Some would be running a much safer route between Mane Cal and their home ports to bring out more modules; the ideal operation conditions were to have three full loads of modules per ship; that way they could be unloading at Mane Cal, loading at Maretesia Prime and also in flight, all simultaneously.

"How are we for Life support with the hab-modules?" Nasarin asked.

"All of them are online independently of course," Pear Blossom said, her job within the ship was known as the ECM, or more properly, the Environmental Consumables Manager, "We're tanking LOX to overpressure safety limits on all tanks to be on the safe side, and storing emergency disposal and water should one of the hab units suffer a breakdown, but we should have enough tender capacity on the habships to fix anything that goes wrong."

"You sound unusually concerned."

"I'm more concerned by the prospect of attack than I am anything else," Blossom said. "The hab units contain shelters, but they're not isolated by internal air section as well as our decks are, and if one of their compartments is breached, we could be losing rather a lot of air before the maintbots close it up."

"Right, the pirates, what are we doing for the people if we get hit?" Nasarin asked.

"Well the habunits have standard counter-boarding suites, and secure shelters within them, which we'll be using our volunteers as orientation staff for," Sharenai said, "And we're supposed to be planting some star-marshals too, if we get enough volunteers with combat rating," she went on for some time after, as they discussed the mission.

Mare Calamari

The first ship of the C'tani flotilla to arrive, though not the 'flagship' in a militaristic sense, had been chosen for the symbolism of the ship. Just under two miles long and practically as wide¹, it was an expanse of green metal, with its outer areas built in an imperialistic, almost militant style, but where its hull caved inward, in recessed areas, fabricated gold glistened over limestone cladding and pink rose quartz crystals obscured by the tonne to decorate it. On its moth-like neutrino radiator and grav-vane wings, which expanded as it decelerated from hyperspeed, feathered filigree of shining gold was laid across these ornamented components, and they were painted in shining pearlescent white. Upon its high sides were silvered runes that were laid in necrontyr sine-script and in equestrian, Undaunted Celestia. A few moments later another, its sister-ship, a similar habitation vessel, Celestia Regnant, adorned similarly but with its rose quartz replaced with pale quartz with metallic coatings to give it a rainbow effect. These were followed by over a hundred other ships of various sizes and classes, some bigger, many smaller, and a pair of huge Great Ships.

(Image)

([url=http://picpaste.com/extpics/wakNLUm9.png]Image)[/url]

Transmission Source: Flotilla Liaison Yarias Silpasdottir ita Hyrekh, Mayor-Captain of Habitation Vessel Charlemane
Destination: Vice Admiral von Kloppenburg of the Golden Armada of The Solar Reign
Subject: Maretesia Prime Relief Mission
Security: Unencrypted General Broadcast

Dear Admiral von Kloppenburg,

Please allow me to express my thanks for your government's acceptance of our assistance in this matter, it is always a delight to be of service to those in need, and we are pleased to aid you in this matter. Please find attached the details of the capacities and abilities of the vessels assembled for our part of this fleet. Furthermore, please at your liberty, advise us to any security precautions you feel necessary for this operation, such as stationing your personnel aboard our vessels; while naturally a degree of appropriate caution will be employed in such matters with regard to any proprietary components and issues, we would welcome the extra security provided by any contingents of your own personnel who can be sent, and naturally, any volunteers from Mane Calamari who may wish to accompany us to provide medical or stewarding assistance, as may well be imagined, staffing for an operation of this size is always a challenge, and we would be most pleased to have any extra hooves available for such tasks, and any such persons will of course be accorded our best hospitality and courtesy under the circumstances.

Yarias ita Hyrekh,
Flotilla Liaison Chief

OOC:
¹ When I get onto art of the Ascension class, it'll be based on this Jupiter Ascending concept.

Aurelia takes her hoof off the transmit button and huffs as the weapons officer works himself into a frenzy. "The Xenos dare to decorate their filthy heathen ship with Her Immortal Majesty's name? This blatant irreverence cannot go unpunished." The Earth Pony's hoofs come dangerously close to the Nova Cannon's controls. "And it will not, brother. But this is not the time nor place." Aurelia pulls his hoofs away in her telekinetic grasp. "The Empress shall deal with all Xenos when the time is right, Her plan is beyond comprehension or questioning. For now, we shall let the Xenos aid us in spreading the Empress's Goodwill and Her Mercy to our fellow Equestrians who have strayed from the Light. We shall return all of Equestria to the Fold and then we shall show the Xenos, the Heretics and the Traitors the Empress's True Mercy, but now bite your tongue brother and bide your time. It will come soon enough." The weapons officer huffs and looks to the Empress's mark around his hoof. "Empress, give me strength."

[The Solar Reign]

The Triton flew through the infinite expanse of hyperspace; its cobalt blue contrails behind its angled sleek form fading in to the tides of chaos that formed around the ship . Hyper space; the place where the fundamental laws of the universe came from; where other universes existed in other domains. Nothing short of a god if one even existed could comprehend the true scale of this turbulent meta space. The Triton was en-route toward a particular system; it was designated the flagship of what was Task force 31. The mission was simple on “paper” an escort and rescue operation. Star command nor the GRF could ignore a call from its allies to assist them in a time of need. And so here the ship was, leading on a task force of 12 ships ranging from frigates, to strike carriers, to destroyers and cruisers.

In the Tritons CIC; the mood of the crew was slightly tense, after all they were heading into a situation where they could be dealing with a great many things; not the least of which was the slow and agonizing deaths of innocent beings. This was less a fear and more of a driving force at this point in time. Alot of star command had been trained for many situations; but training only went so far. The officer chosen to head this mission was a tall; well built brown eyed red haired rear admiral by the name of Deviron Callisto, at the age of a hundred and two he still appeared in his early thirties , no doubt this was a testament to longevity technologies. The CiC was filled with the blips, and beeps of consoles being manipulated by officers on either side of the circular command center; the primary holographic display noting the task forces course appeared clearly before Callisto. During his long life time he had many experiences many jobs; and only joined star command fifty years ago. Deciding he had enough of the various pursuits in life he considered mundane.

Callisto placed a hand on his well shaven squared jaw. He was dressed in the typical flag officer's uniform with the addition of the GRF mission patch to his left shoulder; platinum and white lines trimmed around the black backdrop of the uniforms material; only one of two features to stand out; the others where his epaulettes, gold in color with platinum rank insignia each with a single star along with several service ribbons over his heart.; he sunk into his command chair his eyes glancing from holo console to holo console then to Tritons avatar.

-”Eta until our arrival?”-

The avatar didn’t bother to appear in her photoform projection opting to stay in a fluid vast medium of post singularity existence that only she could understand. She replied with a soft voice; Callisto shifted in his chair as he watched the ships getting closer and closer.


-”We should arrive there momentarily, we’re detecting quite a bit of activity; however they all register as friendly. I think this is train of ships we’re meant to escort,; we’ve got a lot of comm traffic between them and from the affected system.-

Callisto pondered; should he have one of his strike cruisers cloak and shadow the rest of the task force or should he go in showing full colors so t speak. The gears in his mind turned and a few seconds later after glancing to the main three dimensional display; he decided he’d rather have a specter above keeping watch than the Terran ships all going in full view; it was just tactically sound.

Motioning a hand in a fluid fashion Callisto ; said with an accent common to union city.

-”Tell the Republic to run silent; full cloak pattern specter 3”-

Pattern specter 3 was a code for a cloaked ship to loiter close to its objective keeping an eye out with its vast sensors and to feed information to the main battle group; it was also a term meant to cover any vulnerable areas it might spot.

The sophont replied, with that same voice; this time her avatar appeared, it took a microsecond second for the complex message to be sent and reply to be received and processed by the powerful Avatar of the Triton.

-Captain Jaisn of the Republic and its AI acknowledge and are now engaging silent mode. We’re about to jump in to the specified coordinates Admiral. Shall I take the liberty of notifying the convoy of our arrival?”-

Callisto almost chuckled but smirked instead; he nodded and then said with a hint frankness in his voice.

“With the output of our hyper drives and D cores they should have seen us light years away, nonetheless we don’t want to spook anyone.”

And so Triton spoke; it sent out a general signal to every ship within their general area. It was a plain; well tendered message.

Code: Select all

 This is the Terran Alliance Ship Triton; in command of task force 31 and representing the Allied powers , I believe you were expecting us?  We will assist in any manner we can; we’ve brought transports, equipment and other star ships.

Just as that message was sent eleven ships opened swirling mass that would shine as bright as white dwarf stars for a mere instant; giving anyone who would be fast enough a glimpse of the meta space beyond the fabric of space and time.The angled forms of the Terran ships brushed off the seemingly angelic ; and cascading aura of colorful particle energy that they had accumulated around them; these particles seemingly danced across the hull of the ships only to be ultimately sucked back into the spatial whirlpool that was a gateway to infinity.

Each ship came to a crawl the wormholes closing almost instantly as they were spat out, the Triton was at the head of the formation; one of the most modern; multirole and heavily armed ships in the Terran fleet; built to the same standards as her sister ship the republic who didn’t appear in such a flashy fashion of course; but phase shifted in; its cloaking system using a combination of quantum manipulation, interital manipulation and stasis shielding to keep it completely concealed. This complex system however did have its flaws; if it tried to activate its weapon systems or pump more power into its defensive fields; it would cause serious strains on the D core and conduit systems overloading them with demands for energy. Even ships as advanced as the Terran's had limit.

-”All ships being moving into position ; wait for a reply before we make a move; and keep an eye on sensor readouts; I don’t want any surprises.”-

Castillo said commandingly the contrails of each of the ship's phase engines swirling in a cobalt blue fashion only to be distorted and faded as space bulged behind the ships to propel them. The smaller and larger Terran ships formed into a picket formation common for task groups; maneuvering with extreme dexterity and nimble speed to achieve a three dimensional staggered triangular formation


End of part one the Arrival.

Just as Whisper wanted to acknowledge the Admiral's words, one of the sensor officers called out: "New sensor contacts, identification running!"
"UTA.", Whisper called after a second of checking transponder signals.
The Commodore smiled. "Ah, TF 31. I was looking forward..."
"Triton, this is Mane Calamari Orbital Control.", a calm, business-like voice was soon heard, interrupting the Commodore over all frequencies. "Welcome. You are cleared for joining the convoi, unless, of course, the Commodore has something against it."
"Negative, MCOC.", Roller spoke into her own small comm station, not by a long shot something so beautiful and sophisticated such as his. "And a merry welcome from me as well. Commodore Roller, Admiral. As much as it is a pleasure, I would wish for different circumstances." There was a short pause. "If I might be so bold and ask... did the Republic have any problems? She was announced to be present, but I don't have her on my screens?"

Duat

The core of Nasarin’s ship was a slim spar of metal a little over forty meters wide, and over a mile long. Its surface was raised and pocked here and there with a series of hundreds of clamps and dozens of doors, while its spaceframe was reinforced with collapsed matter woven through living metal. Companionways were threaded through it, and elevator tubes, but neither were normally used. Instead, local teleportation was the norm, between the blockish service modules at either end of the ship, while the larger cargo transfer needs were met by the spine-duct, a wide space lined with grapples for just that purpose. Across the spine’s depressurized central tube dozens of doors were set up, allowing access to any of the two score or more colca modules that would sit on the sides and top of the central spine. Each was an irregular hexagonal prism two hundred meters long and the best part of a hundred high and wide. The standard, ubiquitous module was a containerized cargo unit capable of holding thousands of smaller intermodal containers in its tracked interior, and with its own light-duty grav unit, capable of making orbit or descending from it – in principle of longer journeys also.

Beyond the spar was the other head of her ship; like a weight-lifter’s irons, the two heads of the ship, when it was without its cargo, seemed like strangely constructed, ungainly vessels. When they were fully loaded they looked far better, like sleek if blocky spars of metal. Their angular design followed function closely, and the Taminamba or “forgehammer” class colony ship had been its mechanical predecessor.

She turned back to the briefing table behind her, a broad marble piece with a series of indentations for papers, devices, cups and similar on it. It pulled double duty as a formal dining room at times and could be overlaid with a gleaming malachite upper-surface that folded in slats. Around the table a number of officers were gathered. Like her they wore flexible black skin-suits, a form of light protection rated for micro-meteoriod exposure, under their grey utility uniforms. There were no rank insignia or obvious signs of military eminence, for this was a civilian ship, and one that had no need of such posing.

On one side of the table sat Silas, the ship’s integrated communications officer, who acted as the de-fact first officer. Silas was a human or Lizaan ethnicity, and wore unusually short tight hair, he tapped on the marble surface and frowned, reading the stark characters of the displays on the table, paging through them. “A lot of ships in the port queue,” he said, hand swishing across the surface to flip pages. Each container queued for loading was being retrieved from Duat’s deep storage wells. Unfortunately, to some degree that meant that they were slower to load than standard containers. While a simple cargo shipment might be easy to accomplish, the majority of the containers that were being brought up were habitation-containers that would need full individual testing and pre-flight before use to meet the required safety standards. “Might take up to an hour before we’re loaded,” he said.

That was a long time. A ship like the Culindamacil could load and stow its payload in a fraction that time if the payload was ready, but in order to meet with the Liasa request their ship along with so many others was responding to. The term Liasa, or the Right of Liasa, was a word that the Necrontyr notion of social contract gave a special power, compelling obligation on the listeners to assist in a matter of utmost severity and on the speaker only to employ such a word seriously when truly necessary. The Liasa concept, broadly interpreted, gave an ability for full citizens to requisition Necrontyr resources and fellow citizens to a cause. The concept was similar to the ancient Romanii concept of Auctoritas; though in some respects quite different. As part of the Great Civilization the standards of public decorum required that one respond where possible to such a request. To overcome the Observer Effect, that where a request for aid would be ignored on the assumption that ‘someone else would do it’ the Liasa required that any persons in a position to assist such a formal request and aware of it express their willingness or suffer formal shame from their failure.

Of course, where some ancient cousins to the C'tani concept of eminence, known in domestic necrontyr as Arthetesh, had various tribal or religious concepts, their own version was deliberately and consciously blind to birth and intrinsic characteristics, women could gain it as easily as men, technologically sired intelligence as easily as organic, and things from the prosaic differences from religion or sexual orientation to the living and the undead, were all considered equal, at least formally. Likewise, it was considered a means of encouraging morals, not a moral end unto itself, thereby by acting morally, one accrued the respect for Arthetesh, but lost it by the inverse action.

Only other C’tani would normally use the formalities of Arthetesh, of course, but as a courtesy it was generally presumed to apply to others of the highest dignity, it was not a precisely formal rule, there were no laws or investigations, but it was taken as seriously as the mores of any other society. For this reason the request made by Celestia the Undaunted Princess had been taken with the appropriate seriousness by the C’tani, who had raised a large number of volunteers.

It was not unusual; there was no officer present who didn’t have at least an ancestor who had been a slave, or targeted for genocide, or in some other way oppressed until they had been liberated or rescued by the C’tani. The C’tani had launched many aid missions down the years, and by the formal mores of their society a willingness to participate in more of the same was considered essential.

By responding to requests for aid, one gained greater social standing in the eyes of society, in the same way that one might gain by performing a respected profession or gaining monies in most other societies; therefore the loss of income for most present was regarded as little burden. The Culindamacil had unloaded her cargo containers here with Flight-Commander Nasarin’s formal explanation and apology to her clients, and requests for the harbourmasters to resolve such cargos within their deadlines where possible. There would be inconvenience, but they didn’t stand to lose any business in the future or lose much in the way of monies, the virtus-economy of the Great Civilization ran quite parallel to and was in some ways more important than the mere monetary one. There was a simple reason for this; in the Great Civilization, money was not power, and effectively could not buy it; so many things of key importance were produced in hyper-abundance that they were impossible to monetize.

“We’ll have to live with that,” Nasarin said, “What’re we carrying?”

“Mixed load,” he said, looking to his left.

Sharenai, the Payload Deployment and Retrieval Officer, nodded, keying up a breakdown of their berths. Forty eight In all. Eight each along the dorsal and ventral sides, end to end, and sixteen per side, side-by-side.

There were a number of different types of cargo loaded, most of them, as might be expected, were either container-rescue – that was to say, they were loaded with thousands of standard intermodal shipping containers filled with supplies for use by persons in the disaster zone, or in travelling from the disaster zone, others, were habitation, set up as small towns essentially, that could hold hundreds of people in comfort and rather more in this stripped down ‘crisis response’ pattern. A few were Q-modules, which appeared as container-storage units but were quite different given their role, while others were medical – containing entire hospitals, or rescue craft modules, hover-on transport for thousands of light rescue skimmers or even orbital range modules. Three were fabrication, equipped to aid in production of supplies, the breakdowns of these resulted in most being bulk-CHON processing, that could convert organic matter rapidly. Any standard fabricator could accomplish the alchemical mysteries of transmutation from any substance to any other, and most could even use energy, but maximum efficiency was usually gained by simple processing rather than transmutation.

A few, also, were container-utility, containing prefabricated equipment for tasks like building emergency shelters and decontamination, not all necessary in this instance, until someone let a nuclear-pile melt down or something equally unforeseen, in which case having such equipment to hand would be extremely useful.

“There it is,” Nasarin said, pointing at the number three dorsal spineload. “Starport module, never carried one of those before,” she said. Naturally, the peak throughput of the local starports would need to be increased; these were equipped to be landed in a suitable area, fusion-form landing pads and pits around them, and be set up as a terminal for orbital traffic.

“Yes, took some work to balance it,” Sharenai said, flicking her fingers over the display and colouring it by local mass. In the days of reaction-drive ships her job would have been to balance the payload for manoeuvre. Today, it was more to do with grav-stresses and unexpected actions, as well as supervising the sheer quantity of cargo-tender units that a ship like the Vingilot used, “But we’re fine with this configuration. And as long as nobody brings a neutronium basketball on board, we’ll be fine going back as well,” she said. The image amended to simply show sixteen of the current containers attached, the thirteen habitation modules and three Q-modules. “Our first run out will let us shed most of the immediate relief payload and head back to Mane Cal, where the load service unit should be ready for us with a full load of hab modules.”

The huge C’tani fleet was not all going to be going immediately. Some would be running a much safer route between Mane Cal and their home ports to bring out more modules; the ideal operation conditions were to have three full loads of modules per ship; that way they could be unloading at Mane Cal, loading at Maretesia Prime and also in flight, all simultaneously.

"How are we for Life support with the hab-modules?" Nasarin asked.

"All of them are online independently of course," Pear Blossom said, her job within the ship was known as the ECM, or more properly, the Environmental Consumables Manager, "We're tanking LOX to overpressure safety limits on all tanks to be on the safe side, and storing emergency disposal and water should one of the hab units suffer a breakdown, but we should have enough tender capacity on the habships to fix anything that goes wrong."

"You sound unusually concerned."

"I'm more concerned by the prospect of attack than I am anything else," Blossom said. "The hab units contain shelters, but they're not isolated by internal air section as well as our decks are, and if one of their compartments is breached, we could be losing rather a lot of air before the maintbots close it up."

"Right, the pirates, what are we doing for the people if we get hit?" Nasarin asked.

"Well the habunits have standard counter-boarding suites, and secure shelters within them, which we'll be using our volunteers as orientation staff for," Sharenai said, "And we're supposed to be planting some star-marshals too, if we get enough volunteers with combat rating," she went on for some time after, as they discussed the mission.

Mare Calamari

The first ship of the C'tani flotilla to arrive, though not the 'flagship' in a militaristic sense, had been chosen for the symbolism of the ship. Just under two miles long and practically as wide¹, it was an expanse of green metal, with its outer areas built in an imperialistic, almost militant style, but where its hull caved inward, in recessed areas, fabricated gold glistened over limestone cladding and pink rose quartz crystals obscured by the tonne to decorate it. On its moth-like neutrino radiator and grav-vane wings, which expanded as it decelerated from hyperspeed, feathered filigree of shining gold was laid across these ornamented components, and they were painted in shining pearlescent white. Upon its high sides were silvered runes that were laid in necrontyr sine-script and in equestrian, Undaunted Celestia. A few moments later another, its sister-ship, a similar habitation vessel, Celestia Regnant, adorned similarly but with its rose quartz replaced with pale quartz with metallic coatings to give it a rainbow effect. These were followed by over a hundred other ships of various sizes and classes, some bigger, many smaller, and a pair of huge Great Ships.

(Image)

([url=http://picpaste.com/extpics/wakNLUm9.png]Image)[/url]

Transmission Source: Flotilla Liaison Yarias Silpasdottir ita Hyrekh, Mayor-Captain of Habitation Vessel Charlemane
Destination: Vice Admiral von Kloppenburg of the Golden Armada of The Solar Reign
Subject: Maretesia Prime Relief Mission
Security: Unencrypted General Broadcast

Dear Admiral von Kloppenburg,

Please allow me to express my thanks for your government's acceptance of our assistance in this matter, it is always a delight to be of service to those in need, and we are pleased to aid you in this matter. Please find attached the details of the capacities and abilities of the vessels assembled for our part of this fleet. Furthermore, please at your liberty, advise us to any security precautions you feel necessary for this operation, such as stationing your personnel aboard our vessels; while naturally a degree of appropriate caution will be employed in such matters with regard to any proprietary components and issues, we would welcome the extra security provided by any contingents of your own personnel who can be sent, and naturally, any volunteers from Mane Calamari who may wish to accompany us to provide medical or stewarding assistance, as may well be imagined, staffing for an operation of this size is always a challenge, and we would be most pleased to have any extra hooves available for such tasks, and any such persons will of course be accorded our best hospitality and courtesy under the circumstances.

Yarias ita Hyrekh,
Flotilla Liaison Chief

OOC:
¹ When I get onto art of the Ascension class, it'll be based on this Jupiter Ascending concept.

Aurelia takes her hoof off the transmit button and huffs as the weapons officer works himself into a frenzy. "The Xenos dare to decorate their filthy heathen ship with Her Immortal Majesty's name? This blatant irreverence cannot go unpunished." The Earth Pony's hoofs come dangerously close to the Nova Cannon's controls. "And it will not, brother. But this is not the time nor place." Aurelia pulls his hoofs away in her telekinetic grasp. "The Empress shall deal with all Xenos when the time is right, Her plan is beyond comprehension or questioning. For now, we shall let the Xenos aid us in spreading the Empress's Goodwill and Her Mercy to our fellow Equestrians who have strayed from the Light. We shall return all of Equestria to the Fold and then we shall show the Xenos, the Heretics and the Traitors the Empress's True Mercy, but now bite your tongue brother and bide your time. It will come soon enough." The weapons officer huffs and looks to the Empress's mark around his hoof. "Empress, give me strength."

Just as the Commodore began to wait for a reply, even more ships arrived.
It was quite an assembly, hundeds of ships, some simply dwarfing the Majestic-class cruiser, which was her flagship - but for all their size, their purpose was peaceful. They were, at least according to the transponder codes, the civilian convoi from Ctan, some ships with names, which wouldn't exactly be liked by some participants of the whole operation.
This time, however, it was Whisper, who was faster then the Orbital Control: "Attention, Bemenacth, this is Commodore Roller onboard GAS Attentive. Welcome to the convoi. You are cleared for joining in."
Roller nodded at this with a small smile, radiating the 'Well done' she had in her eyes. The sensors and their officer, meanwhile, registered a energy spike onboard the Chardonnay, sending a small informal report to Roller, who gave an inner, defeated sigh. She had a rough idea, of who would have been their target, but calling them out on it before they even began their journey would be counter productive.

To:Flotilla Liaison Yarias Silpasdottir ita Hyrekh, Mayor-Captain of Habitation Vessel Charlemane
From: Vice-Admiral von Kloppenburg

Subject: Re: Maretesia Prime Relief Mission

Dear Mayor-Captain,
please forgive me if I sound rude, I am in a hurry. My squadron is currently in the process of giving the first amounts of aid, as much as we can, and it is a bit taxing, as you maybe can imagine. I, as well as the crews of my ships and the population of Maretesia Prime, are very thankful for your assistance in that matter.

Please address any security concerns to Commodore Roller abouard GAS Attentive, she is the commanding officer of the GA screening force of the convoy.
If you want fighter squadrons and gunships onboard your vessels, though, I can already say, that we will have to decline that. The Golden Armada needs permission of HDM herself to post own squadrons on foreign civilian vessels. I am very sorry about that.
As for volunteers from Mane Calamari, you will have to ask the Orbital Control about that. They usually know things like that.

I am very sorry, that I can't help you in any of these questions myself, but my orders do not permit me to.
I wish you a safe passage!
VAdm von Kloppenburg

[The Fedral Union]

TAS Triton. ETA to operation zones unknown.

The Triton and her formation of ships swang around in various corrective maneuvers that seemed to almost take no time at all. Castillo shifted slightly in his chair; those eyes of his focusing on the holographic projection of the Solarian ships, he waved a hand in a calm fashion toward Triton’s avatar. It was wordless signal for the ship to establish a visual link to the communicating vessel. Castillo as always seemed to have a dashing aura of discipline about him; it took but an infinitesimal time for a link to be established; they used an official secure GRF channel which the Solarians would have access too being as they were members of the Alliance.

The admirals projection would appear almost completely life like; he nodded the commanding equines starting off in a cordial manner first getting to the question of the Republic.

-”I’ve decided it would be in our best tactical and possibly strategic interest to have Republic run silent; under full cloak shadowing us and the convoy. If we are to expect anything other than a tragic disaster we could use an ace up our sleeves; or in your case hooves.-

He wasn’t trying to be offensive in his last comment; merely trying to equate a euphemism of poker to their fellow allies. Castillo let out a sight is eyes wandered again; this was all so sudden, he wondered if there was anything more to this affair than met the eyes. Of course any commander of any fleet needed to consider even unlikely options.

-”I think it might be a good idea to deploy some of our stand off drones from The Pretorian and use the tacitus network to share real time sensor data between them and your own scouts; It’d certainly give long range sensors a boost, and probably decrease time of intercept if we did get any hostiles..-

Castillo sounded sincere yet confident in his idea; how odd it was that eight centuries ago mankind, knew not of any secrets of the universe always dreamt of carrying themselves off to the stars but would have they ever expected to be surrounded by not just sapient equines; but aliens of all kinds. He of course didn’t care what species any being was so long as they didn’t try to kill him, destroy his ship or harmed those he was sworn to protect. His facial expression changed from its usual facade of calm to one concern. The next question he uttered wasn’t sugar coated; and clearly part of him didn’t want to know.

-If I can ask a question; I’d like to know how many of your kin are we expecting to have survived this?-

Castillo needed to know; despite this being a distant system, in a far off nation; the Terrans considered all members of GESO to be like their own brethren or sisters. He was clearly ready in some ways to accept the fact that they may have to see things no one should; that they may have to take wounded, orphaned, dying persons even on their own ships. He added to his question after a second or so of pause.

-”I just want to make sure my crews are as prepared as they can be;; I hope you understand commodore ?-

The Terran Alliance was made up of so many races, many dealt with carnage or death in different ways than others, but none even more primal ones wished it upon innocent souls. Their own history had been filled with tragedy, triumph, pride, the inevitable fall and then the rebirth of their ideals. And more often than not; they had been hardened for quite a few decades to the prospect of war on all sides ; death, that generation was thankfully long gone; Castillo remembered the tale end of Terran Isolation.

-Oh I should tell you, one of our chief civilian medical experts onboard the Gallipoli Doctor , Hyphean Oilis would like to know what he’ll be up against; I know our transports aren’t as massive as the C’tani ships but she’s one of the best doctors we’ve got. It wouldn’t do much good of her to sit idly by.. Not that he’d do so anyway even under my orders.-


Castillo managed a half hearted grin; trying to lighten the transmission. But honestly he couldn’t think of anything else to say to make the situation less horrendous than it was. He folded his hands behind himself eyes trying to catch the gaze of either Equine commander at least so he could tell how bad the news was.


GRV Gallipoli

Doctor Hyphean Oilis; donned a semi conformal containment suit over his rubbery anthropomorphic form; like many of his species he had the standard black and white markings that were much similar to an old earth creature known as a killer whale which was a misnomer as they were dolphins. That said he hurriedly put a meta weaved labcoat over his containment suit the mask of his suit still retracted. A distinguishing feature on him where the green and blue runes; noting the path of healing and ethereal stream of life; he studied under one of the most famous pod persists of the order; and had accredited diplomas from various Terran higher institutions.


He had been practicing medicine for many decades; with the assistance of an implanted AI companion; which was unusual for his species; as they considered that an odd process that only those of the unknown grey ethereal links practiced. Oilis rushed down the slender; corridors of the ship toward one of the specially equipped ICU chambers;, Terran ships were indeed built not just for utilitarian reasons but with a sort of grace and symmetry to them thus the insides of the ships often had accented curves that flowed almost organically even the odd holographic display panels were either hidden seamlessly behind a solid photon barrier or integrated in some form if they had to be external in to the design of the ship.

Oilis came down the hall the last stretched to the specially designed ICU; two marines in their slender yet imposing looking power suits stood guard at the door; they held their rifle as any trained man would; down toward the deck plating; the opaque visors of their helmets quickly verified that it was indeed doctor Ollis that was in front of them. They were of course informed by the ship's avatar he had been on the way but the situation warranted additional verification.

-Doctor; everything is ready to go. Gallipoli tell us she's done the best she could; Medi drones and other personnel have been briefed on how to handle the cases that end up here. -

Oilis signed; this ICU containment room was designed for those equine that might have been affected by a form of corruption in some way; the science on sapient equine care when it came to “telepathic effects” was still new; he hopped the Ctani and the Solarians would be able to take the majority of those cases, all they could do was put them in a stasis ward with mentallic feilding.

-” Gallipoli; are our Medi drones, staff and medical bays at the ready?-

The ship answered with a gentle tone; appearing before the doctor looking over his handsome slightly rubbery features. She nodded.

-We’re as ready as we can be; several corpsmen, medi dorne and marine squadrons are ready to help any evac procedures should things get that bad.-



Gallipoli And Oilis knew that the main ask for the Terran ships and the GRF force was to cover the convoys; but Oilis couldn’t shake a sinking feeling within him; was it his semi empathic abilities being affected by the cries of so many innocent souls; or was it something more insidious, it unnerved him; visibly. Gallipoli asked without hesitation her voice one of concern now.

-”What's got you so worried doctor? -”



Even with her vast intelligence and reaches of those of the Terran ship minds; even they had to sometimes ask questions; they weren’t gods after all.

Oilis replied his tone was one of slight bewilderment and slight caution.

-”I don’t know; there are so many unknowns here; what ever happened and weather it was even natrual on that world is beyond me, as you know my people possess a certain sixth sense if you would call it that. I’ve been bothered by somethings I’ve felt not from the crew.. But from other places; its probably just my imagination and stress.
Gallipoli furrowed an eye ridge and jokingly said; a pair of off duty marines passing the pair by idly chattering about the situation at hand.

-”I’m in command of this ship doc, if you go coo coo for sugar cubes I’ll have master at arms Rimsfield and Major Sheffield thrown into a stasis unit.-

She laughed, Oilis was unamused but feigned a smile.


TAS Triton.

By now the ship's avatar and Castillo had both agreed that the Terran ships would be split in 4 task forces, Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, and Delta. While each squadron would remain in a spear shaped formation, Alpha would be “roaming” below; The Pretorian had already began the process of launching her Stand off drones, each of those bays shimmered open, and slender angled automated drone ships began to buzz away from them the carrier; their powerful phase engines quickly accelerating them toward several rendezvous points with the Terran ships; some others however made their way halfa light year out in a flash of light starting a systematic search pattern and forming an advanced picket. The Task force was small indeed; but the advantages in its technology to apply force multipliers would make up for its small size.


Castillo nor Triton could form a definite plan of engagement; if there was ever going to be one. Their focus now was on defense and escorting duty. Castillo drummed his fingers along the the armrest of his chair waiting for a reply wondering where this whole train of aid would end up. Trying to put the possibility that he’d have to sacrifice task force 31 and its people to allow for the escape of civilians. If it came to it; he’d give the order.

The Terran ships forms took their positions, cobalt blue trails of spiraling energy that warped space time behind them faded in to the darkness, their sleek neutroniclly plated armored hulls hiding the weapon ports that housed their Leviathan like viscous teeth in the form of weapons , with any hope. Castillo and Triton wouldn’t have to use those weapons…. But when did they ever get the best case scenario?

[The Solar Reign]

TAS Triton. ETA to operation zones unknown.

The Triton and her formation of ships swang around in various corrective maneuvers that seemed to almost take no time at all. Castillo shifted slightly in his chair; those eyes of his focusing on the holographic projection of the Solarian ships, he waved a hand in a calm fashion toward Triton’s avatar. It was wordless signal for the ship to establish a visual link to the communicating vessel. Castillo as always seemed to have a dashing aura of discipline about him; it took but an infinitesimal time for a link to be established; they used an official secure GRF channel which the Solarians would have access too being as they were members of the Alliance.

The admirals projection would appear almost completely life like; he nodded the commanding equines starting off in a cordial manner first getting to the question of the Republic.

-”I’ve decided it would be in our best tactical and possibly strategic interest to have Republic run silent; under full cloak shadowing us and the convoy. If we are to expect anything other than a tragic disaster we could use an ace up our sleeves; or in your case hooves.-

He wasn’t trying to be offensive in his last comment; merely trying to equate a euphemism of poker to their fellow allies. Castillo let out a sight is eyes wandered again; this was all so sudden, he wondered if there was anything more to this affair than met the eyes. Of course any commander of any fleet needed to consider even unlikely options.

-”I think it might be a good idea to deploy some of our stand off drones from The Pretorian and use the tacitus network to share real time sensor data between them and your own scouts; It’d certainly give long range sensors a boost, and probably decrease time of intercept if we did get any hostiles..-

Castillo sounded sincere yet confident in his idea; how odd it was that eight centuries ago mankind, knew not of any secrets of the universe always dreamt of carrying themselves off to the stars but would have they ever expected to be surrounded by not just sapient equines; but aliens of all kinds. He of course didn’t care what species any being was so long as they didn’t try to kill him, destroy his ship or harmed those he was sworn to protect. His facial expression changed from its usual facade of calm to one concern. The next question he uttered wasn’t sugar coated; and clearly part of him didn’t want to know.

-If I can ask a question; I’d like to know how many of your kin are we expecting to have survived this?-

Castillo needed to know; despite this being a distant system, in a far off nation; the Terrans considered all members of GESO to be like their own brethren or sisters. He was clearly ready in some ways to accept the fact that they may have to see things no one should; that they may have to take wounded, orphaned, dying persons even on their own ships. He added to his question after a second or so of pause.

-”I just want to make sure my crews are as prepared as they can be;; I hope you understand commodore ?-

The Terran Alliance was made up of so many races, many dealt with carnage or death in different ways than others, but none even more primal ones wished it upon innocent souls. Their own history had been filled with tragedy, triumph, pride, the inevitable fall and then the rebirth of their ideals. And more often than not; they had been hardened for quite a few decades to the prospect of war on all sides ; death, that generation was thankfully long gone; Castillo remembered the tale end of Terran Isolation.

-Oh I should tell you, one of our chief civilian medical experts onboard the Gallipoli Doctor , Hyphean Oilis would like to know what he’ll be up against; I know our transports aren’t as massive as the C’tani ships but she’s one of the best doctors we’ve got. It wouldn’t do much good of her to sit idly by.. Not that he’d do so anyway even under my orders.-


Castillo managed a half hearted grin; trying to lighten the transmission. But honestly he couldn’t think of anything else to say to make the situation less horrendous than it was. He folded his hands behind himself eyes trying to catch the gaze of either Equine commander at least so he could tell how bad the news was.


GRV Gallipoli

Doctor Hyphean Oilis; donned a semi conformal containment suit over his rubbery anthropomorphic form; like many of his species he had the standard black and white markings that were much similar to an old earth creature known as a killer whale which was a misnomer as they were dolphins. That said he hurriedly put a meta weaved labcoat over his containment suit the mask of his suit still retracted. A distinguishing feature on him where the green and blue runes; noting the path of healing and ethereal stream of life; he studied under one of the most famous pod persists of the order; and had accredited diplomas from various Terran higher institutions.


He had been practicing medicine for many decades; with the assistance of an implanted AI companion; which was unusual for his species; as they considered that an odd process that only those of the unknown grey ethereal links practiced. Oilis rushed down the slender; corridors of the ship toward one of the specially equipped ICU chambers;, Terran ships were indeed built not just for utilitarian reasons but with a sort of grace and symmetry to them thus the insides of the ships often had accented curves that flowed almost organically even the odd holographic display panels were either hidden seamlessly behind a solid photon barrier or integrated in some form if they had to be external in to the design of the ship.

Oilis came down the hall the last stretched to the specially designed ICU; two marines in their slender yet imposing looking power suits stood guard at the door; they held their rifle as any trained man would; down toward the deck plating; the opaque visors of their helmets quickly verified that it was indeed doctor Ollis that was in front of them. They were of course informed by the ship's avatar he had been on the way but the situation warranted additional verification.

-Doctor; everything is ready to go. Gallipoli tell us she's done the best she could; Medi drones and other personnel have been briefed on how to handle the cases that end up here. -

Oilis signed; this ICU containment room was designed for those equine that might have been affected by a form of corruption in some way; the science on sapient equine care when it came to “telepathic effects” was still new; he hopped the Ctani and the Solarians would be able to take the majority of those cases, all they could do was put them in a stasis ward with mentallic feilding.

-” Gallipoli; are our Medi drones, staff and medical bays at the ready?-

The ship answered with a gentle tone; appearing before the doctor looking over his handsome slightly rubbery features. She nodded.

-We’re as ready as we can be; several corpsmen, medi dorne and marine squadrons are ready to help any evac procedures should things get that bad.-



Gallipoli And Oilis knew that the main ask for the Terran ships and the GRF force was to cover the convoys; but Oilis couldn’t shake a sinking feeling within him; was it his semi empathic abilities being affected by the cries of so many innocent souls; or was it something more insidious, it unnerved him; visibly. Gallipoli asked without hesitation her voice one of concern now.

-”What's got you so worried doctor? -”



Even with her vast intelligence and reaches of those of the Terran ship minds; even they had to sometimes ask questions; they weren’t gods after all.

Oilis replied his tone was one of slight bewilderment and slight caution.

-”I don’t know; there are so many unknowns here; what ever happened and weather it was even natrual on that world is beyond me, as you know my people possess a certain sixth sense if you would call it that. I’ve been bothered by somethings I’ve felt not from the crew.. But from other places; its probably just my imagination and stress.
Gallipoli furrowed an eye ridge and jokingly said; a pair of off duty marines passing the pair by idly chattering about the situation at hand.

-”I’m in command of this ship doc, if you go coo coo for sugar cubes I’ll have master at arms Rimsfield and Major Sheffield thrown into a stasis unit.-

She laughed, Oilis was unamused but feigned a smile.


TAS Triton.

By now the ship's avatar and Castillo had both agreed that the Terran ships would be split in 4 task forces, Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, and Delta. While each squadron would remain in a spear shaped formation, Alpha would be “roaming” below; The Pretorian had already began the process of launching her Stand off drones, each of those bays shimmered open, and slender angled automated drone ships began to buzz away from them the carrier; their powerful phase engines quickly accelerating them toward several rendezvous points with the Terran ships; some others however made their way halfa light year out in a flash of light starting a systematic search pattern and forming an advanced picket. The Task force was small indeed; but the advantages in its technology to apply force multipliers would make up for its small size.


Castillo nor Triton could form a definite plan of engagement; if there was ever going to be one. Their focus now was on defense and escorting duty. Castillo drummed his fingers along the the armrest of his chair waiting for a reply wondering where this whole train of aid would end up. Trying to put the possibility that he’d have to sacrifice task force 31 and its people to allow for the escape of civilians. If it came to it; he’d give the order.

The Terran ships forms took their positions, cobalt blue trails of spiraling energy that warped space time behind them faded in to the darkness, their sleek neutroniclly plated armored hulls hiding the weapon ports that housed their Leviathan like viscous teeth in the form of weapons , with any hope. Castillo and Triton wouldn’t have to use those weapons…. But when did they ever get the best case scenario?

Roller nodded. "Seems like a prudent course of action, Admiral.", she replied - she wished a ship, that could cloak like that, it would be very useful in her usual line of operations, especially since she once had been a Vice Admiral and Commander of the Cruisers (as this position still existed) herself. The reasons why she was a Commodore and commander of her own battlegroup were plenty.
She watched the UTA-ships move into position, their drones launched. They would be useful, but she had her fighter-squadrons.
"As for survivors, current reports by Von dem Huf indicate roundabout four billion survivors, around three billion refugees in one way or the other. They also estimate at least fifty million people wounded with a much larger dark figure of people, who were simply not in medical care by now. The squadron is helping where they can."
With that cleared, and the report forwarded to all ships assigned to the convoi, no matter where they were from, Commodore Roller nodded towards Lieutenant Whisper, who switched to a public frequency. "GAS Attentive to all ships of the Maretesia Prime Relief Convoi. We are sending you the coordinates for the first navigation point. In the light of the reports you fine gentlecreatures got, I belief, that you all agree, that we should get our plots moving. All stragglers will be redirected by the Mane Calamari Orbital Control. Any questions or concerns from anyone?"

[The Children of Celestia]

TAS Triton. ETA to operation zones unknown.

The Triton and her formation of ships swang around in various corrective maneuvers that seemed to almost take no time at all. Castillo shifted slightly in his chair; those eyes of his focusing on the holographic projection of the Solarian ships, he waved a hand in a calm fashion toward Triton’s avatar. It was wordless signal for the ship to establish a visual link to the communicating vessel. Castillo as always seemed to have a dashing aura of discipline about him; it took but an infinitesimal time for a link to be established; they used an official secure GRF channel which the Solarians would have access too being as they were members of the Alliance.

The admirals projection would appear almost completely life like; he nodded the commanding equines starting off in a cordial manner first getting to the question of the Republic.

-”I’ve decided it would be in our best tactical and possibly strategic interest to have Republic run silent; under full cloak shadowing us and the convoy. If we are to expect anything other than a tragic disaster we could use an ace up our sleeves; or in your case hooves.-

He wasn’t trying to be offensive in his last comment; merely trying to equate a euphemism of poker to their fellow allies. Castillo let out a sight is eyes wandered again; this was all so sudden, he wondered if there was anything more to this affair than met the eyes. Of course any commander of any fleet needed to consider even unlikely options.

-”I think it might be a good idea to deploy some of our stand off drones from The Pretorian and use the tacitus network to share real time sensor data between them and your own scouts; It’d certainly give long range sensors a boost, and probably decrease time of intercept if we did get any hostiles..-

Castillo sounded sincere yet confident in his idea; how odd it was that eight centuries ago mankind, knew not of any secrets of the universe always dreamt of carrying themselves off to the stars but would have they ever expected to be surrounded by not just sapient equines; but aliens of all kinds. He of course didn’t care what species any being was so long as they didn’t try to kill him, destroy his ship or harmed those he was sworn to protect. His facial expression changed from its usual facade of calm to one concern. The next question he uttered wasn’t sugar coated; and clearly part of him didn’t want to know.

-If I can ask a question; I’d like to know how many of your kin are we expecting to have survived this?-

Castillo needed to know; despite this being a distant system, in a far off nation; the Terrans considered all members of GESO to be like their own brethren or sisters. He was clearly ready in some ways to accept the fact that they may have to see things no one should; that they may have to take wounded, orphaned, dying persons even on their own ships. He added to his question after a second or so of pause.

-”I just want to make sure my crews are as prepared as they can be;; I hope you understand commodore ?-

The Terran Alliance was made up of so many races, many dealt with carnage or death in different ways than others, but none even more primal ones wished it upon innocent souls. Their own history had been filled with tragedy, triumph, pride, the inevitable fall and then the rebirth of their ideals. And more often than not; they had been hardened for quite a few decades to the prospect of war on all sides ; death, that generation was thankfully long gone; Castillo remembered the tale end of Terran Isolation.

-Oh I should tell you, one of our chief civilian medical experts onboard the Gallipoli Doctor , Hyphean Oilis would like to know what he’ll be up against; I know our transports aren’t as massive as the C’tani ships but she’s one of the best doctors we’ve got. It wouldn’t do much good of her to sit idly by.. Not that he’d do so anyway even under my orders.-


Castillo managed a half hearted grin; trying to lighten the transmission. But honestly he couldn’t think of anything else to say to make the situation less horrendous than it was. He folded his hands behind himself eyes trying to catch the gaze of either Equine commander at least so he could tell how bad the news was.


GRV Gallipoli

Doctor Hyphean Oilis; donned a semi conformal containment suit over his rubbery anthropomorphic form; like many of his species he had the standard black and white markings that were much similar to an old earth creature known as a killer whale which was a misnomer as they were dolphins. That said he hurriedly put a meta weaved labcoat over his containment suit the mask of his suit still retracted. A distinguishing feature on him where the green and blue runes; noting the path of healing and ethereal stream of life; he studied under one of the most famous pod persists of the order; and had accredited diplomas from various Terran higher institutions.


He had been practicing medicine for many decades; with the assistance of an implanted AI companion; which was unusual for his species; as they considered that an odd process that only those of the unknown grey ethereal links practiced. Oilis rushed down the slender; corridors of the ship toward one of the specially equipped ICU chambers;, Terran ships were indeed built not just for utilitarian reasons but with a sort of grace and symmetry to them thus the insides of the ships often had accented curves that flowed almost organically even the odd holographic display panels were either hidden seamlessly behind a solid photon barrier or integrated in some form if they had to be external in to the design of the ship.

Oilis came down the hall the last stretched to the specially designed ICU; two marines in their slender yet imposing looking power suits stood guard at the door; they held their rifle as any trained man would; down toward the deck plating; the opaque visors of their helmets quickly verified that it was indeed doctor Ollis that was in front of them. They were of course informed by the ship's avatar he had been on the way but the situation warranted additional verification.

-Doctor; everything is ready to go. Gallipoli tell us she's done the best she could; Medi drones and other personnel have been briefed on how to handle the cases that end up here. -

Oilis signed; this ICU containment room was designed for those equine that might have been affected by a form of corruption in some way; the science on sapient equine care when it came to “telepathic effects” was still new; he hopped the Ctani and the Solarians would be able to take the majority of those cases, all they could do was put them in a stasis ward with mentallic feilding.

-” Gallipoli; are our Medi drones, staff and medical bays at the ready?-

The ship answered with a gentle tone; appearing before the doctor looking over his handsome slightly rubbery features. She nodded.

-We’re as ready as we can be; several corpsmen, medi dorne and marine squadrons are ready to help any evac procedures should things get that bad.-



Gallipoli And Oilis knew that the main ask for the Terran ships and the GRF force was to cover the convoys; but Oilis couldn’t shake a sinking feeling within him; was it his semi empathic abilities being affected by the cries of so many innocent souls; or was it something more insidious, it unnerved him; visibly. Gallipoli asked without hesitation her voice one of concern now.

-”What's got you so worried doctor? -”



Even with her vast intelligence and reaches of those of the Terran ship minds; even they had to sometimes ask questions; they weren’t gods after all.

Oilis replied his tone was one of slight bewilderment and slight caution.

-”I don’t know; there are so many unknowns here; what ever happened and weather it was even natrual on that world is beyond me, as you know my people possess a certain sixth sense if you would call it that. I’ve been bothered by somethings I’ve felt not from the crew.. But from other places; its probably just my imagination and stress.
Gallipoli furrowed an eye ridge and jokingly said; a pair of off duty marines passing the pair by idly chattering about the situation at hand.

-”I’m in command of this ship doc, if you go coo coo for sugar cubes I’ll have master at arms Rimsfield and Major Sheffield thrown into a stasis unit.-

She laughed, Oilis was unamused but feigned a smile.


TAS Triton.

By now the ship's avatar and Castillo had both agreed that the Terran ships would be split in 4 task forces, Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, and Delta. While each squadron would remain in a spear shaped formation, Alpha would be “roaming” below; The Pretorian had already began the process of launching her Stand off drones, each of those bays shimmered open, and slender angled automated drone ships began to buzz away from them the carrier; their powerful phase engines quickly accelerating them toward several rendezvous points with the Terran ships; some others however made their way halfa light year out in a flash of light starting a systematic search pattern and forming an advanced picket. The Task force was small indeed; but the advantages in its technology to apply force multipliers would make up for its small size.


Castillo nor Triton could form a definite plan of engagement; if there was ever going to be one. Their focus now was on defense and escorting duty. Castillo drummed his fingers along the the armrest of his chair waiting for a reply wondering where this whole train of aid would end up. Trying to put the possibility that he’d have to sacrifice task force 31 and its people to allow for the escape of civilians. If it came to it; he’d give the order.

The Terran ships forms took their positions, cobalt blue trails of spiraling energy that warped space time behind them faded in to the darkness, their sleek neutroniclly plated armored hulls hiding the weapon ports that housed their Leviathan like viscous teeth in the form of weapons , with any hope. Castillo and Triton wouldn’t have to use those weapons…. But when did they ever get the best case scenario?

Roller nodded. "Seems like a prudent course of action, Admiral.", she replied - she wished a ship, that could cloak like that, it would be very useful in her usual line of operations, especially since she once had been a Vice Admiral and Commander of the Cruisers (as this position still existed) herself. The reasons why she was a Commodore and commander of her own battlegroup were plenty.
She watched the UTA-ships move into position, their drones launched. They would be useful, but she had her fighter-squadrons.
"As for survivors, current reports by Von dem Huf indicate roundabout four billion survivors, around three billion refugees in one way or the other. They also estimate at least fifty million people wounded with a much larger dark figure of people, who were simply not in medical care by now. The squadron is helping where they can."
With that cleared, and the report forwarded to all ships assigned to the convoi, no matter where they were from, Commodore Roller nodded towards Lieutenant Whisper, who switched to a public frequency. "GAS Attentive to all ships of the Maretesia Prime Relief Convoi. We are sending you the coordinates for the first navigation point. In the light of the reports you fine gentlecreatures got, I belief, that you all agree, that we should get our plots moving. All stragglers will be redirected by the Mane Calamari Orbital Control. Any questions or concerns from anyone?"

"None here, Attentive. INS Chardonnay and accompanying escorts are warming up the warp engines and preparing for the first jump." Aurelia answers as the techpriests aboard make their offerings to the machine spirits and awaken those living in the engines.

[The Solar Cooperative Union]

PMV Bedouin, Mane Calamari
Captain Sar Birtus was a cruel-looking turian, one of his mandibles ravaged in a long-ago firefight, his crests blunt or missing from yet another battle. He had survived it all, and come to be the captain of the Bedouin, a formidable cruiser built by Lexmada Shipyards. He had led this ship into battle a dozen times, leaving the shattered hulls of pirate ships and smugglers scattered across half a dozen systems. By all accounts Sar was not a individual to be taken lightly, and now here he was, playing baby-sitter for a bunch of horses. He couldn't quite decided if he'd reached his highest or lowest point, but being the professional soldier that he was he decided to put his personal opinions aside.

Of course, Corporate didn't just want him here to play nice with the equines, his ship had been fitted with high-power scanners for the explicit purpose of gathering as much as intelligence as possible and then selling it back to the Federal Navy for a heavy-price. He had also been "gifted" a compliment of Operators, killing machines trained to fight in the vacuum of space. Most of his crew was Turian but the operators and marines were a mix of Quarians and Humans, and the tensions had been running high for a couple days before they had arrived at their destination.

Commander Elantin stomped into the bridge, wearing her armor as always. She was a average human female, with short brown hair pulled back into a pony-tail. Sar didn't quite like her, but he couldn't help but respect her, seeing as she jumped onto enemy spaceships for a living. She turned towards him, her helmet cradled under one arm.

"My boys are ready for anything Cap, I'd say we're good to hit it"

"Right"

Captain Birtus turned to the communications console and began his broadcast to the assembled ships, his gravelly turian voice projecting authority and confidence.

"This is the Bedouin and escort frigates reporting in, ready for FTL jump at the signal of expedition leader."

[The Solar Reign]

Roller nodded. "Seems like a prudent course of action, Admiral.", she replied - she wished a ship, that could cloak like that, it would be very useful in her usual line of operations, especially since she once had been a Vice Admiral and Commander of the Cruisers (as this position still existed) herself. The reasons why she was a Commodore and commander of her own battlegroup were plenty.
She watched the UTA-ships move into position, their drones launched. They would be useful, but she had her fighter-squadrons.
"As for survivors, current reports by Von dem Huf indicate roundabout four billion survivors, around three billion refugees in one way or the other. They also estimate at least fifty million people wounded with a much larger dark figure of people, who were simply not in medical care by now. The squadron is helping where they can."
With that cleared, and the report forwarded to all ships assigned to the convoi, no matter where they were from, Commodore Roller nodded towards Lieutenant Whisper, who switched to a public frequency. "GAS Attentive to all ships of the Maretesia Prime Relief Convoi. We are sending you the coordinates for the first navigation point. In the light of the reports you fine gentlecreatures got, I belief, that you all agree, that we should get our plots moving. All stragglers will be redirected by the Mane Calamari Orbital Control. Any questions or concerns from anyone?"

"None here, Attentive. INS Chardonnay and accompanying escorts are warming up the warp engines and preparing for the first jump." Aurelia answers as the techpriests aboard make their offerings to the machine spirits and awaken those living in the engines.

There were energy spike along the entirety of the Chardonnay, so the sensor officer nodded towards Commodore Roller.
"Acknowledged, Chardonnay.", the Commodore said into her comm. "Good luck and Celestia be with you." She had a good feeling about the second in command of that force, seeing a capable officer with an incapable commanding officer.
It was, like it always was - and who had to suffer? The good officers, who disobeyed their orders to go and die pointlessly, without even a religious use.
There were reasons, why Roller wasn't a Vice Admiral anymore.

PMV Bedouin, Mane Calamari
Captain Sar Birtus was a cruel-looking turian, one of his mandibles ravaged in a long-ago firefight, his crests blunt or missing from yet another battle. He had survived it all, and come to be the captain of the Bedouin, a formidable cruiser built by Lexmada Shipyards. He had led this ship into battle a dozen times, leaving the shattered hulls of pirate ships and smugglers scattered across half a dozen systems. By all accounts Sar was not a individual to be taken lightly, and now here he was, playing baby-sitter for a bunch of horses. He couldn't quite decided if he'd reached his highest or lowest point, but being the professional soldier that he was he decided to put his personal opinions aside.

Of course, Corporate didn't just want him here to play nice with the equines, his ship had been fitted with high-power scanners for the explicit purpose of gathering as much as intelligence as possible and then selling it back to the Federal Navy for a heavy-price. He had also been "gifted" a compliment of Operators, killing machines trained to fight in the vacuum of space. Most of his crew was Turian but the operators and marines were a mix of Quarians and Humans, and the tensions had been running high for a couple days before they had arrived at their destination.

Commander Elantin stomped into the bridge, wearing her armor as always. She was a average human female, with short brown hair pulled back into a pony-tail. Sar didn't quite like her, but he couldn't help but respect her, seeing as she jumped onto enemy spaceships for a living. She turned towards him, her helmet cradled under one arm.

"My boys are ready for anything Cap, I'd say we're good to hit it"

"Right"

Captain Birtus turned to the communications console and began his broadcast to the assembled ships, his gravelly turian voice projecting authority and confidence.

"This is the Bedouin and escort frigates reporting in, ready for FTL jump at the signal of expedition leader."

"Acknowleged, Bedouin.", Roller replied to the gruff-sounding voice.
There had always been a sort of disgrunted respect from officers of the Golden Armada towards mercs, simply because they were capable soldiers. This case wasn't different and the person she was talking with was seen by the Intelligence Service as a highly capable soldier and commander. He was experienced and his crews were, too.
"Glad to have you with us!", the Commodore closed her statement.

[Perseid Federation]

Astrostratós Light Cruiser PSO Thalassa [CLDR-116]
Military Screening Force of the Omospondia, en route to Mane Calamari — circa 1364 XS

---

The Perseids don't look like they were going to risk much of their ships in this expedition. A convoy of 40 civilian craft escorted by 10 of the Astrostratós' warships have exited out of a phase jump conducted in the outskirts of the Mane Calamari System. This system seemed to be unknown and foreign to the Perseid vessels, in the sense that they were hostile to the likes of them, but they were hoping that their given coordinates will guide them through these dangerous cosmic 'waters.' Georghios Diasakos, known as Captain Geo to his subordinates on the PSO Thalassa, wasn't feeling too sure about what other entities may come along. All that he got was that the star states participating in this humanitarian effort are mostly GESO members, which wasn't all that assuring.

After all, even through all of these years of isolationism, they know very well that the route that they will be taking is rife with raiding parties and pirate groups—which may be the justification why the civilian craft of the Somia Foundation had to be escorted by warships. To add to the uncertainty, they were going to be accompanied by mercenaries hired by the Solar Reign. Geo never trusted mercenaries in his entire life, even if they seemed to be genuine and loyal enough for him to hire. To him, if they were indeed genuine and loyal to him, they wouldn't need to be paid that much money.

Guess a break wouldn't be coming to him any time soon, since the Perseid convoy was making their way to Mane Calamari. Xanthe just stood by the Captain's console as a message from a certain group of ships coming from elsewhere in the system was picked up. "This is the Terran Alliance Ship Triton," played the message in Universal, "in command of Task Force 31 and representing the Allied powers, I believe you were expecting us? We will assist in any manner we can; we've brought transports, equipment and other star ships." The AI Servitor thought that that must be the Terrans coming in abundance into the system. An FTL signature had been detected elsewhere in the system shortly after that identified with the Terrans.

"Well well well," Xanthe reported, "looks like the Terrans have arrived at the party. From the looks of it they're cloaked, since we are detecting anomalies of a different mass compared to the surrounding space."

"Of course they are," Geos replied as he moved over to the holographic table. "This must be a precautionary measure against any would-be raiders. To be frank, many of the ships here would do the same, including us." The Perseid vessels were indeed cloaked to prevent being spotted by any hostiles in the area. He did notice that the convoy is drawing closer and closer to their destination, so he might was well hail them now. Geo returned to his seat and ordered Xanthe to open up a communications channel with Mane Calamari, which she did. A holographic screen appeared in the middle of Geo's console, to which he began his audio message. He addressed in Universal, "Salutations Golden Armada of the Solar Reign, this is the captain of the PSO Thalassa. We will be assisting you in this humanitarian undertaking in any way we can. Glad you could have us."

[The Solar Reign]

(Image)

Astrostratós Light Cruiser PSO Thalassa [CLDR-116]
Military Screening Force of the Omospondia, en route to Mane Calamari — circa 1364 XS

---

The Perseids don't look like they were going to risk much of their ships in this expedition. A convoy of 40 civilian craft escorted by 10 of the Astrostratós' warships have exited out of a phase jump conducted in the outskirts of the Mane Calamari System. This system seemed to be unknown and foreign to the Perseid vessels, in the sense that they were hostile to the likes of them, but they were hoping that their given coordinates will guide them through these dangerous cosmic 'waters.' Georghios Diasakos, known as Captain Geo to his subordinates on the PSO Thalassa, wasn't feeling too sure about what other entities may come along. All that he got was that the star states participating in this humanitarian effort are mostly GESO members, which wasn't all that assuring.

After all, even through all of these years of isolationism, they know very well that the route that they will be taking is rife with raiding parties and pirate groups—which may be the justification why the civilian craft of the Somia Foundation had to be escorted by warships. To add to the uncertainty, they were going to be accompanied by mercenaries hired by the Solar Reign. Geo never trusted mercenaries in his entire life, even if they seemed to be genuine and loyal enough for him to hire. To him, if they were indeed genuine and loyal to him, they wouldn't need to be paid that much money.

Guess a break wouldn't be coming to him any time soon, since the Perseid convoy was making their way to Mane Calamari. Xanthe just stood by the Captain's console as a message from a certain group of ships coming from elsewhere in the system was picked up. "This is the Terran Alliance Ship Triton," played the message in Universal, "in command of Task Force 31 and representing the Allied powers, I believe you were expecting us? We will assist in any manner we can; we've brought transports, equipment and other star ships." The AI Servitor thought that that must be the Terrans coming in abundance into the system. An FTL signature had been detected elsewhere in the system shortly after that identified with the Terrans.

"Well well well," Xanthe reported, "looks like the Terrans have arrived at the party. From the looks of it they're cloaked, since we are detecting anomalies of a different mass compared to the surrounding space."

"Of course they are," Geos replied as he moved over to the holographic table. "This must be a precautionary measure against any would-be raiders. To be frank, many of the ships here would do the same, including us." The Perseid vessels were indeed cloaked to prevent being spotted by any hostiles in the area. He did notice that the convoy is drawing closer and closer to their destination, so he might was well hail them now. Geo returned to his seat and ordered Xanthe to open up a communications channel with Mane Calamari, which she did. A holographic screen appeared in the middle of Geo's console, to which he began his audio message. He addressed in Universal, "Salutations Golden Armada of the Solar Reign, this is the captain of the PSO Thalassa. We will be assisting you in this humanitarian undertaking in any way we can. Glad you could have us."

"Thalassa, this is Mane Calamari Orbital Control. We aren't part of the Golden Armada.", a voice replied to the hailing, a hint of amusement betraying a small smile. "I will forward you to Commodore Roller, GAS Attentive. Stand-By."
There was a short pause, as the communications officer of the Orbital Control relayed the call towards the cruiser in his orbit, which would lead the whole expedition.
After a small click, a new voice spoke up: "This is Commodore Roller on board GAS Attentive. Thalassa, it's a great honour to have you with us. Please form up with the rest of the convoy and be ready to receive jump coordinates. If there are any questions, feel free to ask them now before later."
Roller didn't want to be rude, she just was a tad bit busy with organizing the last few things for the whole operation - it appeared as if any support coming in later was out of question, the Armada didn't have anything to spare at a moment's notice or if they had it, they weren't in range. The MCDF was out of question for now as wel, they were an Independant Client State after all.
So, no Star Destroyers for her, but she could live with it. She had a good fleet and friends with her - and a large of new acquaintences. They would later, when everything was over, have dinner to get to know eah other a bit better, but that was later. They had more urgent things to do.

[Perseid Federation]

PSO Thalassa [CLDR-116]
Near Mane Calamari — circa 1364 XS

---

An audio reply was sent to the ship as soon as they have picked up the message. Geo happened to be letting out a slight smirk from the way the Celestial ponies responded, as if he was about to chuckle. "Thalassa, this is Mane Calamari Orbital Control," came back the response. "We aren't part of the Golden Armada." Tapping on the console he replied immediately in Universal, "Mane Calamari Orbital Control, we are aware of that." Paying no attention to this trivial matter, Orbital Control responded, "I will forward you to Commodore Roller, GAS Attentive. Stand by."

For the time being there was a short pause that passed, until the Golden Armada's commanding officer came on the line. "This is Commodore Roller on board GAS Attentive. Thalassa, it's a great honor to have you with us. Please form up with the rest of the convoy and be ready to receive jump coordinate. If there are any questions, feel free to ask them now before later."

The Perseid did have a concern in mind. For them, it wasn't healthy that they immediately begin this humanitarian expedition right away, for their ships have to be inspected and refueled for the coming journey. After pausing, Geos put up his question to the Commodore. "Commodore Roller this is Captain Georghios Diasakos, commanding officer of the PSO Thalassa. I would like to inquire the set time that this mission may begin, for we should be ensuring that our fuel is enough to make the journey. Should we commence when all parties have arrived at Mane Calamari or should our ships remain for a time before we set off to our destination?"

By this time, the Perseid convoy were entering the gravitational influence of the planet, and began to shift into another formation. The escort military craft surrounded the civilian vessels as they maneuvered and adjusted themselves into a stable orbit. A liaison reported, "Omospondia convoy moving into stable orbit" as the map projection continued to trace the convoy's current position. Xanthe was already getting concerned. "From the looks of it, the route is already beginning to fill with heavier raider activity. Our scout drones that went ahead of the main convoy have detected in the Regimare Cloud and in the Princess Asteroid Belt, just beyond Marelowe. While pirate activity has been around for years, the numbers have gone above normal."

Sitting back down on his chair he shifted again about his chair. "Telling from the number of escort military vessels that the entire convoy has, I think we'll be fine. Besides that, the civilian craft have been given certain defensive countermeasures to prevent them from being lost to pirate attacks." Xanthe didn't seem convinced, as she knows that sheer firepower and revolutionary hull structure and armor can only carry them so far in this dangerous area of the cosmos…

[The Solar Cooperative Union]

PMV Bedouin
Mane Calamari
Tac...Tac...Tac

Birtus drummed his callous fingers on the arm of his chair, the holographic command interface parting as he brought each talon-like finger to contact the metal. He had grown impatient with waiting in orbit over the planet, the drivel of a conversation he could muster with his human inferiors was now exhausted, even though it had been little worth carrying-on. These humans always complaining, telling him how the chefs food was sub-par, how the food "back home" was far better. They all had the exact same opinion on the exact same non-issues. Both Turians and Humans were social animals, but in different ways he figured.

Humans, he had observed, where like ants. They tumbled over each other, rushing towards a common goal but hardly moving in order, they moved like a wave, stumbling and bumping their way into the unknown, destroying and trampling everything before them. Alone a human was a meager threat, but a human was never alone, just like how ants would swarm. The pink apes would show up on a world and have it covered in their hives before the Turians could even lay a claim.

Turians, his kind, were like wolves to the humans ants, predators, deadly alone or in packs and always sniffing, prodding and listening to the way before them. Never taking a step without a measure of the risk, they were slow to expand, slow to make decisions, but always impeccable in their expansion and decision making.

He pushed those thoughts out of his mind as he brought up the holographic command interface on his arm-rest, prompting a high fidelity screen to appear at his eye level. It displayed a live feed of the assembled fleet, the strange ships of the equine-kind where the target of his intelligence gathering mission, if he could get a decent read on their layout, weapons assembly and power profile he could sell the intelligence at an exorbitant price to the Federal Navy, maybe even retire, not that he would want to do that. He pulled up the comm-feed with the bridge and spoke, his voice still low and gravelly, but this time measured and reserved.

"Move us within scanner range of the Attentive and begin low-profile scans, dont let them know we're even looking, the faster we can get what we came for the less time we have to spend dying for these miserable horses."

[The Solar Reign]

(Image)

PSO Thalassa [CLDR-116]
Near Mane Calamari — circa 1364 XS

---

An audio reply was sent to the ship as soon as they have picked up the message. Geo happened to be letting out a slight smirk from the way the Celestial ponies responded, as if he was about to chuckle. "Thalassa, this is Mane Calamari Orbital Control," came back the response. "We aren't part of the Golden Armada." Tapping on the console he replied immediately in Universal, "Mane Calamari Orbital Control, we are aware of that." Paying no attention to this trivial matter, Orbital Control responded, "I will forward you to Commodore Roller, GAS Attentive. Stand by."

For the time being there was a short pause that passed, until the Golden Armada's commanding officer came on the line. "This is Commodore Roller on board GAS Attentive. Thalassa, it's a great honor to have you with us. Please form up with the rest of the convoy and be ready to receive jump coordinate. If there are any questions, feel free to ask them now before later."

The Perseid did have a concern in mind. For them, it wasn't healthy that they immediately begin this humanitarian expedition right away, for their ships have to be inspected and refueled for the coming journey. After pausing, Geos put up his question to the Commodore. "Commodore Roller this is Captain Georghios Diasakos, commanding officer of the PSO Thalassa. I would like to inquire the set time that this mission may begin, for we should be ensuring that our fuel is enough to make the journey. Should we commence when all parties have arrived at Mane Calamari or should our ships remain for a time before we set off to our destination?"

By this time, the Perseid convoy were entering the gravitational influence of the planet, and began to shift into another formation. The escort military craft surrounded the civilian vessels as they maneuvered and adjusted themselves into a stable orbit. A liaison reported, "Omospondia convoy moving into stable orbit" as the map projection continued to trace the convoy's current position. Xanthe was already getting concerned. "From the looks of it, the route is already beginning to fill with heavier raider activity. Our scout drones that went ahead of the main convoy have detected in the Regimare Cloud and in the Princess Asteroid Belt, just beyond Marelowe. While pirate activity has been around for years, the numbers have gone above normal."

Sitting back down on his chair he shifted again about his chair. "Telling from the number of escort military vessels that the entire convoy has, I think we'll be fine. Besides that, the civilian craft have been given certain defensive countermeasures to prevent them from being lost to pirate attacks." Xanthe didn't seem convinced, as she knows that sheer firepower and revolutionary hull structure and armor can only carry them so far in this dangerous area of the cosmos…

PMV Bedouin
Mane Calamari
Tac...Tac...Tac

Birtus drummed his callous fingers on the arm of his chair, the holographic command interface parting as he brought each talon-like finger to contact the metal. He had grown impatient with waiting in orbit over the planet, the drivel of a conversation he could muster with his human inferiors was now exhausted, even though it had been little worth carrying-on. These humans always complaining, telling him how the chefs food was sub-par, how the food "back home" was far better. They all had the exact same opinion on the exact same non-issues. Both Turians and Humans were social animals, but in different ways he figured.

Humans, he had observed, where like ants. They tumbled over each other, rushing towards a common goal but hardly moving in order, they moved like a wave, stumbling and bumping their way into the unknown, destroying and trampling everything before them. Alone a human was a meager threat, but a human was never alone, just like how ants would swarm. The pink apes would show up on a world and have it covered in their hives before the Turians could even lay a claim.

Turians, his kind, were like wolves to the humans ants, predators, deadly alone or in packs and always sniffing, prodding and listening to the way before them. Never taking a step without a measure of the risk, they were slow to expand, slow to make decisions, but always impeccable in their expansion and decision making.

He pushed those thoughts out of his mind as he brought up the holographic command interface on his arm-rest, prompting a high fidelity screen to appear at his eye level. It displayed a live feed of the assembled fleet, the strange ships of the equine-kind where the target of his intelligence gathering mission, if he could get a decent read on their layout, weapons assembly and power profile he could sell the intelligence at an exorbitant price to the Federal Navy, maybe even retire, not that he would want to do that. He pulled up the comm-feed with the bridge and spoke, his voice still low and gravelly, but this time measured and reserved.

"Move us within scanner range of the Attentive and begin low-profile scans, dont let them know we're even looking, the faster we can get what we came for the less time we have to spend dying for these miserable horses."

Roller nodded. "The time of departure was actually set to be once all questions were cleared, so if you need more time to check your fuel, you would become a straggler." The Commodore exchanged a few short texts with the command onboard GAS Dragon Buster. "If that would be the case, Corvette-Squadron 12 will remain here and give you additional firepower once you are ready to depart. If not, what I actually would prefer, then you will be part of the main convoy."
It was no secret, that the farther one got away from New Canterlot, the more pirates and other undesireable elements lined every trade route and shipping lane, which was one of the reasons for the Golden Armada Trade Protection Force's existance, but out here, they didn't have enough ships and enough firepower to actually mount such an operation.
This was a matter for the Golden Armada and their fleet. Roller simply wished, that she could give her orders from a star destroyer's, maybe even a large star destroyer's bridge instead of her cruiser's.
Not that she was going to complain: Every sensor scan would show, that this specific Majestic-class cruiser was not only an older model, but lacking behind the technical possibilities of the Reign. She had a strong armament built for the attack, not for the defense, just like Roller liked, a strong hull, thick armour, but relatively weak shields and no point defense. They had escorts for that.
Their hangar bays were filled with fighters and bombers, ready to be launched at a moment's notice, their engines already warmed up and happily drinking fuel from the storages on board.
They would be a valuable asset in any coming fight - and fighting they would, so much was clear. They were a dangerous and very profitable target. Every bit of scum and villany would come at them and expect a go. Ion engines and manouvering thrusters kept them aong their way, but other then these things any fleeting scan would be overshadowed by the fifteen Trilithium Torpedoes onboard, carried in case they needed to make a planet uninhabitable for the next century or so.
All in all, the Golden Armada regarded the Majestic-class as a reliable front-line combattant, used side by side with both Sabre-class cruisers and newer models, but they were going to be used up, no more ships of this kind were to be built. Newer models were there for exactly that, the Majestic would first be relegated to second-line duties and then scapped.
It was a shame, if one asked many of their crews.
A ping went out to the Bedouin, a small reminder, that they were leaving their assigned place in the formation, something not really liked by the professional officers of the Golden Armada.

[The Fedral Union]

”There doesn't seem to be much in the way of activity out there”

Said Triton breaking the semi pervasive silence that permeated the CIC; it had only been half an hour or so since Castillo made contact with the Solarian fleet commander. As uneventful as thing have been he still felt a bit of trepidation about this whole affair. The Admiral replied shifting in his chair slightly. The escort had by now already made its jump to the first way-point; through the complex and seemingly ethereal dimension that was hyper space.

-”Lets hope it stays uneventful; maybe we can get through this without encountering any wild cards. “-


Triton couldn’t really blame Castillo or any of the other crew; they were about to head onto the scene of what could be described as a cliche tragedy. To have it compounded by other complex variables would be rather troublesome. The only response the avatar could make was one of attempted reassurance.

“I’m sure we’ll be able to handle what ever the galaxy can throw at us; that's why we're here isn't it?”

Castillo gave a faint nod, then let out a slight sigh; he placed his hands on the armrests on each side of his seat, his eyes focused on the three dimensional hologlobe in front of him scanning the intricate images of space time that to him any most other sapients had to be interpreted in a less complex manner by the ship's avatar and computer systems, the result was a more mundane readout than what the ship's sensors could truly ascertain.

“I take it’s all quiet on the front for the drones too?”

Castillo asked with a hint of expectation in his voice, the avatar replied with the answer he was half hardheartedly expecting of it..

-”So far, there hasn’t been..-

The avatar was cut off, Castillo furrowed an eyebrow glancing up at it, he kept his calm facade about him as best he could , one could see that the specter of tension wasn’t all lost upon his facial features.

The avatar continued after a split second delay, as the vast machine mind it wielded sunk into deep thought.

-”I don’t know, there was just a slight anomaly on scanners, I’ll try to clear things up.”

Castillo glanced over to the sensor readouts,they didn’t show much other than a slight discrepancy that was barely noticeable. Castillo sunk back into his chair replying to the ship's avatar with a slightly cautious inflection.

-“I’ll assume since you’d be the last one to get jumpy that this faint reading would be something to investigate?”-

Triton looked at Castillo who was clearly trying to make a slightly vain attempt at humor and gave him an affirming gaze. Castillo didn’t want to take too many chances but at the same time he and the avatar knew the GRF task force couldn’t expend ships on a search pattern. Despite the power of the avatars on the ships, and their vast processing abilities they were not infallible. This was just statistical probability to the nth scale, would it be A or B? it often plagued any sapient being and even non sapient supercomputers in the form of erroneous readouts. The best conclusion then was to use the next best thing to a ship, involving a focused and intense level of scanning in tandem with a drone or two.

The cosmos was a vast place, even if they found evidence of a ship or anomaly, it could have very well shifted or moved away from the area. The avatar used the ship's sensors once again to reach out and comb the depths and fabric of the universe and its sub-layers, a drone peeled off from Alpha wing making its way toward the sector grid.

Castillo waited, sensor scans from the drone and the ships would converge in an instant, but that instant almost felt like an eternity. The sensor warning receiver let out an odd elongated bloop noise. It was distinct from the beeping noise of a lock or the rapid beeping noise that accompanied incoming ships. Triton then said within a second of that alarm in a calm tone so eloquently imparted by the avatar to hide its own growing slight of unease.

“there's something definitely out there, it almost seemed like an FTL spike, it wasn’t Terran or allied either..”

Castillo frowned, he said quite plainly as his eyes wandered over the holographic globe once more.


-”Tell all wings to be on heightened alert, get me more data on this spike. Get on the ICN and upload the data to allied ships”

The best the GRF could do now was be vigilant; it was only natural after all. The Triton transmitted these readings through the ICN or the integrated combat network. they hopped the combined masses of computing power and inputs of creative thinking pooled together might shed some light on this area of space. It would in hindsight be the height of hubris for anyone to become too complacent. After all even the most ready and vigilant guardian can be caught by surprise.

The Terran's did have one or two sources of wisdom in this case to draw upon, a human of antiquity whom had written a book called the “art of war” made note of the advantages of being perceived as formless.


GRV Gallipoli

“Yeah, the doc has most of the decks above designated for, as he put it emergency medical services..”

A Lance corporal replied to an inquisitive subordinate;the two marines stood a casual foot to half a foot away from one another; they were due to go on duty in a half and hour, and indeed they looked the part. Having donned their slender power suits some time before; a few last moment checks of their displacer rifles and they were ready. The Marine the lance corporal was replying too nodded slightly she still wondered though if it was going to be as bad as they were used too in the simulations or as bad as their NCO’s had said it could be.

“Are they expecting a lot of casualties?”

She asked; it was obvious they both had thought all the civilian and NGO ships and so forth would spare them from seeing much of the carnage at first at least. The lance corporal responded with a small shrug .

“I’m not sure, honestly; I’m more worried this will turn into a rescue op for either us or those freighters. out there.”

The private pondered the situation for a second, she replied to the other marine with a hint of unbridled optimism.

“Every mission has its risk; hell life has its risk but I'm sure its improbable something will go wrong. “

The corporal nodded he slung his displacer rifle over his shoulder. The two walked out of the barracks and into the corridors, this area of the ship had officers and marines alike passing through. They made a left toward the lift; nodding to fellow crew as they passed by them.


“Well at least its true that we get to see the galaxy, though some of the missions they sent me on weren’t what I expected.”

The marine corporal was reminiscing to his partner ; it didn’t take long before the lift hummed to life with energy, this was the only indicator aside from the panels in the pod that the lift was in motion. The private beside him replied her gaze fixated for a moment on the level indicator.

“Well, that's why most of us joined right ? I mean this is one of my first missions but the unexpected can be interesting..”


The corporal nodded, he was just like her when he got out of boot camp and specialist training school, in fact this was an attitude that permeated green recruits all over, but they quickly faded unfortunately.. He has seen men and women become jaded after serving, was it inevitable to him? Would he or his partner become like his father; used to death ?.. It was part of the job, but it wasn’t something either of them wanted to experience, no sane person would. The lift came to a crawl on deck eight; the ship's starboard hangar was just down a long enclosed catwalk; the marines stepped out and made their way towards another lift passed a security drone checkpoint.

The private looked out the vast windows that the catwalk had facing the deck; she could see drones, sophonts and many of her comrades working on gunships; and military grade carry-alls.

I hope I gave an opening to some of our thread mates with this post.

[The Solar Cooperative Union]

Birtus looked at the holo-display that popped up on the infopanel, a ping from one of the Equine craft. Apparently they were watching them and didn't approve of their unprompted movement. He pulled up the communications panel and hailed the commander of the Solarian Fleet. He made sure his expression was neutral as the video feed came to life, before him stood the somewhat grainy image of a equine officer, he assumed it was the captain of the ship, who he had a few things to say to.

"Hello Ma'am, I'd like to clarify the terms of our employment... my company and my crew answer to me, my ships move where I tell them to move. We are not soldiers of your nation and our ships will behave as is required to defend the convoy and reach the objective. If you have a problem with the location of my ship, then you can file such a complaint with our Customer Service department on Alberhalden. Until then, the Bedouin will move as I feel it should."

With that he closed the feed and had the Bedouin hold position, knowing that the equines wouldn't receive his disrespect well, not that he cared, he was simply here to get payed.

[The Children of Celestia]

INS Chardonnay
"Mane Calamari Orbital Control, this is the INS Chardonnay and fellow escorts. Requesting permission for warp travel." Aurelia transmits her message to the grand space station floating above the watery planet as the tech priests aboard their ships finished waking the spirits of the warp generators. Meanwhile on the bridge, the Navigators found their paths to Marelowe.

[The Solar Reign]

Birtus looked at the holo-display that popped up on the infopanel, a ping from one of the Equine craft. Apparently they were watching them and didn't approve of their unprompted movement. He pulled up the communications panel and hailed the commander of the Solarian Fleet. He made sure his expression was neutral as the video feed came to life, before him stood the somewhat grainy image of a equine officer, he assumed it was the captain of the ship, who he had a few things to say to.

"Hello Ma'am, I'd like to clarify the terms of our employment... my company and my crew answer to me, my ships move where I tell them to move. We are not soldiers of your nation and our ships will behave as is required to defend the convoy and reach the objective. If you have a problem with the location of my ship, then you can file such a complaint with our Customer Service department on Alberhalden. Until then, the Bedouin will move as I feel it should."

With that he closed the feed and had the Bedouin hold position, knowing that the equines wouldn't receive his disrespect well, not that he cared, he was simply here to get payed.

Roller laughed as she heard the Bedouin's Captain and his words of disrespect - she expected something like this from muddy mercs, because as good as they usually thought they were, they were mercs after all. Undisciplined lot, because there was a reason why they weren't part of a regular armed force.
"Bedouin, this is Commodore Roller. Let's forego your customer service for a little bit of a heart to heart between a soldier and whatever you think you are.", the mare said into her comm, "I have three reasons for you to follow my orders to the letter. Number one, I was ordered to evaluate your performance in order to make a recommendation, if the Golden Armada or GAIS or whoever being part of us should ever hire you again - customers return, when they are satisfied. I am currently not satisfied. Number two, if I am satisfied with your performance, I was authorized to give you a hefty bonus, a monetary and material reward, a token of gratitude of HDM and the Golden Armada, something, which is a rather informal measure from us for we usually don't deal with mercs like you. Again, I am currently not satisfied."
The mare made a small pause for dramatic effect.
"Number three..." The mare hummed for a moment, before she said as cheeky and commanding as she could, a tone she normally didn't use when in service: "I don't think you don't want to know number three. Questions?"

INS Chardonnay
"Mane Calamari Orbital Control, this is the INS Chardonnay and fellow escorts. Requesting permission for warp travel." Aurelia transmits her message to the grand space station floating above the watery planet as the tech priests aboard their ships finished waking the spirits of the warp generators. Meanwhile on the bridge, the Navigators found their paths to Marelowe.

"Chardonnay, this is MCOC.", the small seapony manning the control station smiled a bit, "You are cleared to jump to warp. Good luck and good hunting!"
There was a short pause, before another voice chimed in: "This is Admiral Beaching aboard MCDFS Storm's End. Good luck from the Mane Calamari Defense Forces and may Celestia guide your way and your missiles to strike true."
"Anyone else anything to add?", MCOC asked over the wavelength and, as no replies came, continued. "Chardonnay, you are a go. We will send the rest out right after your jump."